


Designationally Challenged

by Whendoestheshipsail



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Again, Alternate Universe - BDSM, Anal Sex, Blow Jobs, Bucky deserves all good things, Captain America: The First Avenger, Come Marking, Dom Bucky Barnes, Drugs, Happy Ending, Injections, Light Masochism, Light Sadism, M/M, Masturbation, Steve doesn't want Peggy but she wants him, Steve is Very Confused, Steve is a Needy Bottom, Sub Steve Rogers, That tag amuses me more than it should, anti-steggy, boys crying, but it might become heavy masochism bc apparently i like that, forever hating the russo's, hormone sickness, i don't know how but that's what's going to happen, i wasn't before, just assume all come tags apply, thanks endgame!, that's not relevant but it should always be said, would you like some light masochism with your tea?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-09
Updated: 2019-10-01
Packaged: 2020-10-13 11:01:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 41,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20581418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Whendoestheshipsail/pseuds/Whendoestheshipsail
Summary: Bucky’s determination to take care of Steve once he hit puberty and came into his designation as a dominant was annoying. And unwelcome. When Bucky ships out it’s almost a relief.Then Steve gets the serum. Apparently, it’s changed him from a normal person into a dominant. Except that he doesn’t feel like a dominant. Apparently, that’s just something to do with his hormones being out of whack. There’s drugs for that…. The drugs don’t help.Then he rescues Bucky and everything begins to make a horrible amount of sense. Steve isn’t a dominant, he’s a submissive. Can he convince the man he spent so many years rejecting that things are different now?





	1. Chapter 1

“I can get by on my own, Buck,” Steve says, and he can’t even manage a smile to help him say it convincingly. Telling Bucky ‘no’ was difficult at the best of times. Today, at his mother’s funeral, was the absolute worst of times. Bucky wouldn’t take him seriously if he didn’t make his voice stronger, stand taller like he meant it. He maintained eye contact for as long as he could.

“The thing is, you don’t have to. I’m with you to the end of the line,” Bucky said, and he put his hand out, gripped Steve between the shoulder and the neck. A bold display of dominance which was still fairly new but already annoying.

Bucky’s dominance displays had gotten old the moment they started.

A few months before Bucky’d presented as a dominant the casual touches between them had changed. They’d become more frequent and lasted longer. Steve had to give Bucky a look or even tell him to back off. It had created a lot of tension when there hadn’t been any.

And then everything had gotten worse because Bucky had come into his designation, and now it seemed like all Bucky did was hover over him and practically growl at anyone who came close. As if Steve _belonged_ to him. As if Steve was small and weak. Bucky did it because he thought Steve needed protection.

Screw that. Steve got enough of that from his ma. Well, he had. How could she be gone? Tears filled his eyes and grief swamped him. It seemed to ebb and flow and now it was back again. She’d been sick for a while but that didn’t mean he’d ever really thought she’d go. Sarah Rogers was the strongest person he’d ever known. How could she die?

Bucky gave him a little shake. Steve thought about decking him. If they were going somewhere, Bucky would often lead the way, even if it was walking just half a step ahead. He’d try to guide Steve with a hand on his back, and now there was this grip, hard, pressing…claiming.

Steve’s mother was dead and Bucky was practically vibrating with the need to take care of Steve. It was suffocating. He’d hoped Bucky would get it when he didn’t go with him to the cemetery, but now there was this possessive touch near his neck, the leaning in, practically looming over him and declarations that it was the two of them until the end.

God, the urge to knock his hand away and jam an elbow into Bucky’s stomach, to let him know just how unwelcome this was…anger was better than pain.

But, today of all days, Steve was so sad and grief stricken that he didn’t have the energy to deal with keeping Bucky at bay. Anger required energy and Steve didn’t have any.

Steve was like most people and didn’t have a secondary designation. He was just a normal person, so this heightened behavior of Bucky’s seemed excessive. Usually, they’d joke about it and Bucky would be embarrassed. He’d go out and find some girl who had a submissive designation and then he’d be right as rain for a few days, sometimes a week. Then they could be friends again and it would be easy.

Now, with his ma gone, Bucky would be even more unbearable. And, today it was tempting to just give in, step forward and let Bucky hold him while he cried.

Bucky would fucking love that, Steve thought, unable to attach much anger to the thought. 

Bucky was dressed in his best suit, looking so grown up and handsome. He was all sympathy and protective strength. As if he’d provide for Steve if he was given half a chance. Would it really be so bad to let Bucky take care of him? Just a little bit? He could take a single step closer and Bucky would wrap Steve up in his arms and try to protect him from everything.

He’d make sure Steve ate and slept, start paying for everything and before he even knew it he’d be coddled, treated as frail as he really was. And that was the real danger because Steve was terrified he just might like it. And Steve would rather die than need to be taken care of. He looked weak on the outside but he wasn’t weak on the inside. They both needed to remember that.

Steve took a breath in and pulled away, like an iceberg floating away from its anchor. His stomach twisted unhappily. He wanted Bucky to touch him, to make him feel better, but this was his first test of being able to live independently. He couldn’t crumble now.

And Steve wasn’t a submissive. A few months from now, when he was more himself he’d regret giving in. Then Bucky would feel betrayed, devastated and Steve knew they might not come back from that.

“Right. You’re your own man,” Bucky said, hoarsely. Bucky flexed his hand and shook it out like Steve had something horrible on his jacket. Steve couldn’t even be bothered to look. Maybe he did. Maybe he’d been standing at his ma’s grave and a bird had crapped on him. Or a tree had dropped sap onto him. Who cared?

Bucky looked a little wide-eyed and bewildered so he took a deep breath and tried to care. “I’m sorry, Buck. I think there’s going to be a moment where I fall apart here pretty soon and I want to avoid it as long as I can. It’ll be better if I’m alone. I’ll just see you later?” he tries to smile, then turns to go inside.

“Should I come back tomorrow morning to check on you?”

“You’ve got work,” he says, being as gentle as he can because Bucky is blinking rapidly and his eyes look a little wet. That same hand opens and closes. Did he hurt himself?

“Steve. Didn’t we just go over this? You matter to me. I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Buck,” he said, determined to dissuade him. “I’m not a submissive and I’m not _yours_. I don’t need you to protect me. You need to get yourself under control. And I need…I need some space. I’m sorry.”

Bucky reared back like Steve had physically slapped him. “I don’t think that’s…I’m not trying to make you uncomfortable or overstep, Steve. I’m sorry,” he said, sounding apologetic. Steve sighed. Good. Now Bucky would leave him alone. “But,” Bucky said, because there was _always_ a but. “I promise you this isn’t about that. You’re the strongest person I know. You don’t have a submissive bone in your body. Got it,” he said, traces of bitterness underlying everything. “This isn’t about designation, it’s about friendship. Friends help each other when things go wrong.”

“I don’t want you to take care of me!” he snaps, needing to end this conversation. How many times does he have to say it before Bucky leaves him alone?

Bucky nods. “Fine. It isn’t for you. You don’t need anyone. You don’t need _me_. I get it. I _fucking_ get it. But maybe this isn’t about me pitying you or whatever, it’s about doing the right thing. You think your ma wouldn’t want me to come check on you?”

Steve narrowed his eyes. “You always think you’re so fucking smart, don’t you?” He closed his eyes, jaw clenched and Steve felt bad. Bucky was just trying to help and he could practically hear his mother telling him to be kind to Bucky. “Fine. You got it, Buck,” he said, and he even leaned closer, wrapped his arms around Bucky, pulled him in for a hug.

Bucky’s body, so strong and hard, so much larger than his and so vital made him feel weak and needy. He _hated_ feeling like that. He’d felt like it his whole damned life. Some part of Bucky would be happy if Steve just fell apart and sobbed all over him, needed him to be strong enough to support Steve, too. That was part of being a dominant.

He pulled back, pushed him away. Even managed a bit of a smile. He got inside his tiny apartment, looked around at how empty it was, how cold and terrifyingly quiet the space was now that his mother was gone and wondered how the hell he was going to go on.

When Bucky showed up in the morning, Steve made sure he was showered, dressed, and he’d even forced down an egg and a piece of toast. Bucky looked relieved to see him so put together, coping so well. And Steve wished he felt more smug about pulling it off than he actually did.

“I’ll see you after work, pal.”

“But, it’s Friday.”

“So?”

“You go out on Fridays. Dancing and whatnot.” ‘Whatnot’ meaning getting close to the submissive girls, getting to “express his designation” and let off some steam.

“I don’t care about that. I need to be with you.”

“No, actually you don’t. Don’t change anything because of me. I’m not yours, Bucky. And we can’t keep having this conversation. Aren’t you sick of it?”

Bucky blushed and swallowed. “I know that.” Shit. If Bucky started crying Steve would really feel like an asshole.

“Then _stop_ trying to take care of me. You’re…you’re gonna break us, Buck.”

Bucky put his hands over his face and dragged in a few breaths. The urge to tell Bucky everything was fine, even to apologize, grew but he managed to keep his mouth shut. Boundaries were hard.

Finally, Bucky got himself together and managed his trademark smirk. “I’m sorry, Stevie. I’ll do better. That’s what you need so that’s what I’ll do.”

And he did.


	2. Chapter 2

Dr. Erskine took a sip of his drink. “The government wanted to give the serum to a dominant. That way lies madness. Too much strength and aggression already. All of it heightened. It makes monsters out of men.”

“That makes sense,” Steve says. The doctor nods, happy to have someone listen and agree.

“I tell the Americans that submissive designation would be best. No one wants that. Too unpredictable. Too weak. They want a soldier. They want a killer. So we get no designation. But, _you_. You have the empathy and heart of a submissive, the desire to do the right thing and yet you are normal. Nothing exceptional either way.”

Steve frowns. The doctor is right, of course, but he’s never thought of his lack of designation as a failure. It seemed like the one thing his body had done right. “The serum will heighten everything you are and remake you on a _fundamental_ level.” He gave Steve a look. “There are those who would not be able to deal with so much change.”

Steve shrugged. “I’ve always been so sick and weak that feeling anything strongly…well, it sounds like an improvement if you want to know the truth.”

The doctor nodded. “Good. Well then, tomorrow, everything changes.”

And it did.

He became someone completely different in a matter of moments. Someone strong and powerful. He could breathe easy, see in color, stand up straight. Even taking his blood was different. Before they’d had trouble finding a vein, now Howard was ordering a nurse to clean up a mess as his blood had overfilled the tube. That part actually made Steve a little nauseous.

But there was another change too. Noticeable in his blood immediately were dominant markers indicating that somehow the serum had changed that too, and given him a designation. Remade him into a dominant like Bucky.

It was hard to sit still while they did their tests. Steve wanted to run everywhere. He wanted to feel that burn of exertion in his lungs, feel his heart pounding, healthy and whole. He fidgeted. He couldn’t get comfortable. His anxiety cranked up and before long he felt…pent up.

Howard had thought it was hilarious. He’d slapped Steve on the back and said, “Welcome to the club.” He’d then gone on and on about the girls Steve would now get since he was a dominant and a ‘Giant Adonis’. His words.

Howard sounded jealous. Steve had no idea how he felt. All he knew, from the first night after the change and onwards was that nothing was ever enough. He was always hungry and antsy.

He was always thinking and practically spinning with ideas and possibilities and he was _always_ hard. If someone asked him what he wanted, told him he could have anything, he didn’t know if he’d say he needed a fight or to get off.

And getting off was its own weird problem. Being transformed into a super-soldier was like being on drugs. There was a constant unsettled twitchiness that he hadn’t figured out how to reign in and a large part of him was terrified he never would. This horrible feeling of thwarted lust and heaviness in his groin might be permanent. This might be his new normal. What if he’d traded in one kind of miserable existence for another?

God, they’d done so many experiments on him that first day. So many that his sex drive hadn’t been a problem. But then they’d taken him to his new quarters and he’d been on his own with nothing to do and almost instantly he’d put a hand down his pants and started to touch himself. He needed it.

And everything felt different. So fucking good compared to how he’d felt before. As he came hard, that first spurt actually having distance in front of him, rather than the weak dribble he’d always known, he’d thought that maybe this was a perk that would make it worthwhile.

He felt calm and relaxed. He might sleep for a week. He cleaned up and went to take a shower, stripped off his clothes, looked in the mirror and felt sick to his stomach.

That body in the mirror…that wasn’t him. The person in front of him was a lie. Steve touched his body curiously, trying to maintain a sense of calm detachment so he didn’t panic. His chest had been bony, birdlike. Now he had…well, he almost had cleavage. He pushed his pecs together, saw his cock twitching in response and quickly let go.

It didn’t matter. He was doing this to help his country. This was his sacrifice. Hadn’t he known that he would be remade? That everything would change? And hadn’t he done it gladly? So, all this uncomfortableness or whatever it was he felt wasn’t just pointless but practically insulting to the gift he’d been given.

His old body was the failure. It was so deficient it would have been the death of him. There was nothing to miss. How did someone miss a heart murmur?

Steve decided he was just unsettled from the long day. Over tired even. It had been a horrible day. Not just painful and then grief-filled with the death of Dr. Erskine, but he’d also been a lab rat, been given a designation and then sent off to be on his own.

He missed Bucky. He needed someone to talk to. Someone who wouldn’t judge him or make fun of him. Although, it was a bit much to think Bucky would understand why he missed his old body. And yet, even if Bucky didn’t understand why he missed it,he’d understand that Steve did. He’d give Steve sympathy. He’d…hug him.

He shivered. The idea of someone touchinghim was… well, apparently this new body liked the idea of beingtouched. His nipples were suddenly hard points and he stroked them, curious.

It was bizarrely electric, connected to his cock and his balls and he stared at his cock in the mirror, watched it get hard as he played with his nipples. Was that all it took? Would this be his new normal? Imagine someone touching him, even Bucky no less, and he’d get an erection?

And then his dick just kept growing.

It was…it was obscene. Horrifying. He turned away from the mirror and hesitated before the shower. He could see it out of the corner of his eye. It was hard too, almost flush against his stomach and it was like a monster. Everyone would know if he got hard. He’d have to be very careful with what he wore now, make sure his underwear was tight enough and kept him in place.

No. His stomach roiled and he threw up the huge meal he’d eaten barely half an hour ago. Which was also awful. Vomiting wasn’t one of the illnesses he was all that used to. And the quantity of it was revolting.

Stupid to feel like his body was betraying himself becuase he now had a giant cock. Every other man would kill for a massive thing between their legs. And he should be glad becuase he was a dominant and girls would like that.

He got the tub filled and climbed in. He didn’t fit. Back home, he’d fit in the tub. He rinsed himself hastily, felt sick to his stomach again as he dried his cock and his balls and got out, fell to the bed and went to sleep.

He dreamed of Dr. Erskine. And then he dreamed about Bucky. He dreamed that Bucky saw him and didn’t recognize him. Imagined begging Bucky to spare his life and the lack of recognition. He jerked awake as Bucky pulled the trigger, somehow confusing Steve for a traitor or a German or something bizarre that only made sense in dreams.

He only slept for three hours that night. And he felt fine. As in, his body didn’t hurt and his brain didn’t feel all that fuzzy from lack of sleep, which was what usually happened when he was sleep deprived. Apparently his body didn’t need the extra down time.

Physically he was fine, but he wasn’t happy or in a good mood. He went for a run. And then he kept running. When the fuck would he be tired of running? Was there an end point? Was there something that was too much.

He ran until got so bored he couldn’t stand it anymore and then he came back to the room they’d put him up in and he took a shower. He was hard again. He closed his eyes as he jerked off, tried not to look at it. He tried to convince himself that he couldn’t tell the difference, that his hand was bigger too so it was actually kind of the same. Aproportional feel. It took him a lot longer to come then it had the day before. He didn’t want to play with his nipples, didn’t want to touch them as they weren’t really his and they made him want to cry. It was just so unsettling to feel all these things he’d never felt before.

Ultimately, he went back to thinking of Bucky. Of getting a hug from him, maybe of being told he’d be okay. That Bucky would stick with him until the every end. And, somehow, as he kept stroking himself and getting nowhere, he rememberedthat time he’d touched Steve with that hard grip on his shoulder. How firm and heavy his hand had been. The look of determination on Bucky’s face. And that suit. He’d always looked so good in that suit.

Steve came.

Which meant that there was a definite sense of worry and confusion as he underwent more tests that day. Once again they took blood. They reassured him that he was now a dominant. They informed him that the army had a few women of submissive designation whose entire job was basically to be a glorified prostitute. If Steve needed to ‘avail himself’ of her services he should be comfortable to say so. Peggy had left at that. Clearly disgusted by the very idea.

Steve was disgusted too. Couldn’t imagine that. How horrible for those women! And, no, he did not want one of them to help him out. Whatever that might mean. Howard despaired of him. “You’re going to pass up government approved pussy? They _know_ things.”

“How do you know?”

Howard blinked. “Everyone knows. Well, maybe if one doesn’t have a designation then they don’t know. I guess they wouldn’t care but you do have a designation and you’re high enough up the food chain they’ll get you a girl. Jesus, you’re a lucky bastard. They are trained in how to _please_, Steve. She’ll come into the room and sink to her knees. You know they train them how to do that? So it’s smooth. And they look at you while they do it. Eye contact and then,” he gestures to his own cock. “It’s like an invitation. You can go right up to her and put your dick in her mouth and she’ll love it. That’s the thing people don’t understand is how much they fucking love it.”

“You’re a pig. No woman wants that.”

“No. A normal woman doesn’t want that. A submissive woman, she wants that. You try to wine and dine a submissive girl and she’ll be dry as the god damned Sahara. These submissive girls want to serve. And now they’re not just serving you, they’re serving their country by getting you off. Jesus Christ.”Steve can tell that Howard is getting hard just thinking about it.

Steve is too, but he’s terrifyingly worried that they’re not thinking about the same thing. Howard is talking about thelipstick they wear and how they get so wet they squelch if you finger them and Steve can’t get past the idea of sinking down to his knees and staring hungrily at a man’s bulge. Would it really be like that? A dominant…maybe like Bucky because Bucky was a dominant. Did he do that on his nights out? For all those years when Bucky would go out and come back all relaxed and happy… had he done that? Found a girl and she sucked his cock with unwavering enthusiasm?

He licks his lips. “What about…what if a woman is a dominant? She find a submissive guy?”

Howard gives him a look. A little disgusted maybe. “You’re thinking about Peggy, right? She isn’t a dominant. She’s just a ball buster. Nothing designational about that.”

No, he hadn’t been thinking about Peggy. Why would he? He was trying to figure out the sexy part of it all. He could only see it from the wrong perspective, like it didn’t make sense yet. And so he was just wondering. That was all.

“I’m serious.”

“There aren’t a lot of submissive guys around. And if they are they keep their mouth shut, you know? Easier to say designational confusion.”

Steve can’t let that opening go. Questions he’d not wanted answers to before, suddenly seem critical. “I had a friend who was confused. Designationally. You know?”

“Guy?”

Steve nods. Can’t bring himself to say it aloud. He already regrets it. Like somehow he’s putting Bucky in danger or outing himself for his weird thoughts. Even if they are temporary. Being gay is illegal. The only time there’s any hint of understanding is if designation is involved. When one is young and first coming into their designation, sometimes people confuse the desire to dominate someone with the desire to use them sexually. So a guy might try to dominate his male friend or a submissive girl might try to hit on a strong, older woman.

But that means they need help. That means they’re confused. It isn’t allowed or legal. Bucky hadn’t actually _wanted _Steve like he wanted a girl, he’d just been confused a little.

At one point, he’d thought Bucky’s mom was worried about it. She’d even hinted at it, tried to ask some oblique question as to whether or not Bucky was okay, if maybe his attentions weren’t just inexperienced and confused but were more serious. Of course, Steve had protected Bucky and denied it.

Bucky’s parents were just religious enough that they might’ve scraped together the money to send their only son to one of those institutions for deviants who liked their own sex and even worse, were gay and designational deviants. That was like the double whammy of perverse.

When Bucky had come into his designation and fixated on Steve, there’d been concern Bucky liked him more than he was supposed to. Because Steve was small and weak. But, Bucky had denied it. And he’d never tried to kiss Steve or shove him to his knees. Sometimes he’d get overly affectionate with him, grab him around the neck and haul him close or Steve would get into yet another fight and Bucky would haul him to his feet and wipe the blood off of his face ever so carefully.

His pupils would dilate and there was more than one time where Bucky’d had to just walk away. He’d go into the bathroom and jerk off and then he’d be out, finding some submissive girl to help get it out of his system.

They’d gotten past that.

Jesus. What would happen when he saw Bucky again? And the fantasy was suddenly brilliant and full colored in his mind. What if Steve was in another fight, covered in blood and Bucky was there, wiping his face, looming over him, touching his lower lip with his thumb. Bucky would be so pissed. God, he’d drag Steve home, shove him into the chair in the kitchen and get an ice pack. He’d stand between Steve’s legs and press the pack close, maybe even into the bruise so it hurt a little. Just a little.

“You don’t learn, Stevie. What’s it gonna take to get you to learn? You’re gonna run into the wrong people and then what? They won’t let you go. Won’t just hit you and walk away.”

“What will they do?” he’d ask, and he’d lick his lips. “Show me what they’d do.”

And Bucky would unbuckle his pants, and pull down the zipper. “Open, Stevie,” Bucky would say and he’d press his big, hard cock into Steve’s mouth.

Steve jumps to his feet and dashes to the bathroom. He’s opening his pants, jerking his cock, that stupid, ridiculously big thing between his legs and he isn’t coming even though he really fucking wants to and he can tell he’s close.

He is. He’s _really_ close. Finally, he squeezes harder, keeps his eyes closed so he doesn’t have to see his stupid dick and tries to get back into the fantasy.

Bucky looming over him.

Bucky opening his pants with that look in his eyes.

Bucky with a hand on Steve’s collarbone and neck pulling him forward. Urging Steve to, no _forcing_ Steve to— he comes.

It doesn’t feel as good as he’d thought it would but it _was_ good. He touches his balls, the large, heavy orbs and winces. Full. He still feels like he’s full. Before the serum, if he’d felt like this it would be because he’d been sick and hadn’t come in a week or two. It’s exactly the same feeling.

But, he did come, so it’s fine. It has to be. He puts his cock away, tucks it into his pants carefully, makes sure the shaft is lying straight up and hopefully not visible. It’ll go down in a minute. He waits in the stall for a bit and then gives up, goes out to the sink and washes his hands, splashes water on his face and looks in the mirror, trying to identify the bits of him that are still the same.

His nose and eyebrows are the same. His lips are basically the same. He shifts on his feet and adjusts himself again. His cock is still hard. He pets himself through his clothing, watching his stupidly large hand touch the freakishly large cock he’s now stuck with. His touch is maddening.

Steps are approaching the bathroom and he dashes back into a stall, faces the toilet like he’s urinating and stands there while someone else comes in. They pee and leave and Steve has no other alternative but to open his pants up and try again. It’s uncomfortably hard and his dick throbs as he gets it out of his tight underwear.

He’s gotta start thinking about this differently. He needs to enjoy it. He’s lucky he’s so big now. And, like Howard said, he can probably have any submissive girl he wants. He’s a dominant so he likes that now. More than likely he just has to see a submissive girl and then it will all fall into place.

That realization is such a fucking relief that he relaxes, lets his hand go back to his pec and stroke his nipple through the fabric. He likes that. The problem is that he only knows Bucky. He’s got a designation now, his sexuality is altered, the first of his kind no less, and so it just has to switch on. He’s like a duckling that’s imprinted on a mother goose because he doesn’t know any better. But, once he sees a duck he’ll be good.

This is an aberration, then. In a day or two he’ll never feel confused about Bucky again. He won’t think about Bucky protecting him by punching out any jackass Steve provoked into a fight. Maybe Bucky will teach him to fight properly now. Before he was too worried about hurting Steve. Bucky was the local boxing champ and Steve would watch him, would be there encouraging him, would take care of him when it was over. When Bucky was panting and covered in sweat and bleeding.

God, even the smell of Bucky after a fight was different. He used to joke about how rank Bucky was, wanted to get him into the shower first thing, but now the thought of it makes his balls pull up hard and tight. He strokes hard along the area behind his balls, digging his fingers in until it hurts so much he has to thrust his hips forward like he’s trying to get away.

His dick leaks, just drips as he presses and rubs harder and harder. He’s jerking his dick at the same time but that’s not where he’s really feeling it. It’s his balls and behind them that has all the sensation. He lets go of his cock, whimpers at the loss of his tight grip.

Fuck, he’d really been squeezing it hard, he realizes and pulls on his balls, tugs down hard for as long as he can stand and when he lets go he leaks steadily.

“Better,” he murmurs, talking to himself. He’s just so alone. He shouldn’t be alone when he’s doing this. He should be doing this with someone, _for_ someone. “Bucky, please,” and his mouth makes the shape of the please but he doesn’t give it any sound, no volume. Please is different. Please is begging. Please means someone else is in charge and is giving him permission.

There ain’t no dominant in the fucking world that would say please the way Steve is suddenly wanting to say it. Again, it’s a fluke. It’s corrupted imprinting about to be replaced by the right information. So, it doesn’t matter if he thinks about Bucky, if he imagines asking him and saying please.

“Please can I come?” he whispers, imagining Bucky’s smug expression, how pleased he’d be if Steve was on his knees asking to come while rubbing his face all over Bucky’s hard leaking cock…after a fight. Right after a boxing match and he’s so sweaty and tired but keyed up and he needs to come so he’s just going to get his and Steve has to ask to come because he’s an afterthought.

He comes. The relief he feels at it actually happening terrifies him later. As if, even then, he knew that there was bad news on the horizon. He works that area behind his balls hard as he spasms, helping the momentum, instinctively knowing that the only reason he’s getting this much out is because he’s forcing it to happen.

And it feels good coming out, the way warm water felt unreasonably good trickling over him when he’d been cold and ill. The pleasure of his come spilling out of him and leaving his balls is better than it ever used to be.

Already he wants that again.

He catches his breath, shivers at the dissipating pleasure, is so unnaturally attuned to his body now that he’s had the serum that he can feel his blood pumping through every muscle. If he concentrates, if he thinks about it…can he feel come filling his balls up again, making him pent up? That dull ache is growing with each thud of his heart. No. He can’t be right. He isn’t. That’s weirdly delusional.

He zips up again, cock carefully placed to not be too visible and he steps out of the stall. His balls and that spot behind them are sore, aching from how hard he was on them. He can’t do it like that every time or he’ll be fucking bruised and unable to sit down. Next time he’ll do it normally, dick in hand, thinking of a girl giving him a blow job or…or bent over or something.

Cause that’s the kind of thing dominant men like him get off on.

***

By late afternoon Steve is both exhausted and antsy. He feels vaguely sea sick too and he isn’t eating as much as they want him to. Apparently, he’s already lost two pounds. Eating to maintain this body is going to be its own job. It makes him want to hit something. 

“It’s water weight, too. Don’t worry about it,” Howard says, like it really isn’t a big deal and he isn’t worried. “You’re a specimen of scientific progress, the first step to a new evolution of mankind, you’ll _get_ hungry.”

Peggy is there and she’s not convinced. She’s been standing there watching him for the last ten minutes. Had been watching his hand every time he shoved his hair out of his face or made any gesture. It’s because his hand is trembling. “He’s like a racehorse about to drop dead before the main event,” he heard her murmur from the other room. Because, he can hear everything now, too.

Howard looks him over with a raised brow. “He probably needs to get his rocks off. The man is off the fucking charts, you know.”

Peggy rolls her eyes at him and leaves. Howard puts in a call for a trained submissive and Steve thinks he might throw up. Again. He can’t do it. He’s not going to tell some poor girl to do those things. He just isn’t. He can’t. He doesn’t _want_ to.

“How do I…how do I start?” he asks, because she’s going to be there any moment and there is no one else to ask. Besides, Howard is a dominant who sleeps with every woman that will let him. So, he’s got to have some useful advice.

He remembers he’d tried to ask Bucky that once. How could he just go out and convince a girl to sleep with him or whatever they did on the first date? The blank look on Bucky’s face, the utter confusion had stayed with Steve.

Bucky hadn’t understood the question because it was instinct. You don’t ask a leopard how it knows to hunt an animal. It just does it. Dominance was easy for Bucky. Primal biology. It just happened. They both wanted it. It was easy. Bucky had blushed, which was rare.

Bucky wasn’t the sort of guy who turned away from uncomfortable situations or conversations so even though he was embarrassed, he tried to answer the question. He’d said he just knew what they wanted. Knew the difference between want and need and a good partner could figure Bucky out, too. Bucky had said it was like dancing. Which was fucking obnoxious, because Steve didn’t know how to dance either.

***

So, here’s the thing about the army. There are rules. Lots and lots of rules. When the submissive turned up Steve had been struck dumb. She was beautiful. She looked at Steve like she wanted to eat him alive. Or be eaten alive. He wasn’t sure.

But, she was sure. Just one of those people who ‘knew,’ like Bucky did. She’d looked at him from under her lashes, and he’d actually seen her nipples pebble under her blouse and when she’d come closer he could smell her arousal.

He’d refused on religious grounds, citing the regulation code and there had been lots of silent consternation. Then another submissive had been brought in. Steve smiled at her and told Howard to figure something else out. Whatever they did for dominant men in battle, that was what he wanted.

Turns out they gave them pills containing submissive hormones. Howard said Steve didn’t want to know how they were made. He probably didn’t. So, Steve didn’t ask.

They gave Steve some but he didn’t feel any better. The doctor’s argued and gave Steve an injection, multiplying the dose because he was a super soldier. They found him unconscious in the bathroom with his dick out and a case of priapism.

He was out for two days. He lost ten pounds and went into a coma until they injected him with dominant hormones. When he came to, Howard had everyone clear out so he could tell him.

“Here’s what we’re thinking. Because you know, you’re a medical freak. Your body is burning through your own designational hormone. So we’re replacing it for you. It wasn’t natural for you so you’re unstable.” He shrugs as if it isn’t a big deal.

It must be a big deal or Howard wouldn’t have cleared the room. It must be a big deal or Howard would be looking at him and not talking to him like he’d just given Steve a death sentence.

“Why is this a problem?”

“It’s not a _problem_. It’s just…_unfortunate._ For you. You don’t get to enjoy the benefits of being a dominant. Maybe that will change, it’s still early days. But, they brought you two very beautiful submissiveS that you seemingly had no interest in whatsoever. Did you like them at all?”

He thinks about lying. “No.” Because the last thing he wants is for them to try again.

“Instead you went to the bathroom and…shook hands with yourself.” This is officially the worst conversation Steve’s ever had with anyone. “Look, no judgement. When I was first coming into my designation I was hard all the time. It takes time to get used to and manage. But, you know, it’s not good to uh, let it wait that long. I’m sensing you’ve got a bit of a puritanical thing going on here. Which is great. God is just fantastic, with the plagues and the smiting, and what not. But, uh, you’re gonna need to take care of that sooner. You don’t want to know how we got that to go down.”

“How did you get it to go down?” he asks, instantly.

“I said you _don’t_ want to know,” Howard mutters grimly.

“How?” Steve demands.

“Drugs. Injected directly to the site,” Howard says, crossing his legs like he’s protecting himself from the memory.

“You put…drugs into my penis?”

“Mostly the testicles. You’ve got some fairly big veins that deal with blood flow to the area. Just caused the whole thing to open back up and disappear.”

He doesn’t like it. Obviously. But, it’s a relief. “So, if I…need that again, there’s a way to make the problem go away?”

“Christ, let’s hope not! No, the goal is to get you a steady enough dose of hormones that you feel okay. If you don’t like the girls the military has, that’s your problem, but injecting yourself is not a good idea.”

“What will happen to me?”

Howard huffs. “I don’t know! Maybe you’ll go blind or die of blue balls. I don’t know, because _no one_ has _ever _had this problem before! Whatever you like, you can find a girl to do. So do it. Figure it out. Or jerk off more. But if you don’t come, you’ll get hard. And if you really don’t come then you wind up with that, chronic priapism. Look, take the drugs, we’ll work it out and you’ll be fine. You’re just too dominant for your dominant genes. Like I said, a crazy problem.” He rubs his mustache like it’s a toothbrush rubbing over his teeth. The man would be terrible at poker.

“Howard, whatever it is that you’re thinking, please just tell me.”

Howard rubs his eyes tiredly. “Look. Submissives need dominant hormones to be healthy. Dominants need submissive hormones to be healthy. It’s symbiotic. One gives to the other, etc. The fact that you need such massive quantities of dominant hormones, in anyone else, I’d assume that meant they were submissive. But you have dominant markers in your blood. You are a dominant. So, our working theory is that you’re burning through them and that’s why you’re so unstable. We understand very little about designations. Beyond a blood test and throwing chemicals at you, we just don’t know and we don’t have the technology to understand how designations work. A lot of it is biology and instinct and our treatments are very crude. If…if something appeals to you, do it. If it doesn’t…you may need to do that, too. The need to express one’s designation can lead to people making some very bad decisions.”

Howard leaves then and Steve tries to think about what the man is saying and isn’t saying. But, it’s hard to be cool and logical when the embarrassment of how he was found is still so fresh in his mind. He’d been overcome with the need to come, he’d _hur_t with it. Each step had been agony as his balls were pressed against his body and squeezed tight in his underwear.

He’d gotten into that stall, opened his pants and shuddered at the relief of it all. And then he’d tried to come. He’d focussed on his dick like he used to, jerked it just as he’d always liked and thought about the submissive girls, about the things he would do to them. He’d gotten nowhere.

Maybe his imagination wasn’t good enough. Maybe he should think of it from another perspective. Like Bucky might. What would Bucky do to those girls? What things had Steve heard through the thin walls or Bucky had said in passing over the years? But, focusing on Bucky in any way was problematic, too. The idea of girls with Bucky made Steve feel sick. He shoved that aside, finally managed to get vaguely interested in some fantasy where he imagined himself in their place and came weakly.

His balls had been hot and throbbing. The area behind his balls was swollen. He let his fingers go further back, brushed a finger over the tight, furled entrance of his asshole and it felt….

What he’d felt had terrified him. He’d gone back to jerking his dick and lightly stroking his balls, determined to come like he was supposed to. It’d been frustrating and then it had gotten worse. Worse and worse until Steve was beside himself. This thing between his legs was a nightmare. It was going to ruin his life. It hurt and it demanded all of his attention and he could do nothing to make it feel better. Nothing to make it go down.

And here he was. The last thing he remembered was chanting Bucky’s name and desperately blinking back tears. Then he’d woken up in a hospital bed. He hated it. Hated what they’d made him. How was he going to live like this?


	3. Rescued

There was a ringing in Steve’s ears as they left the Hydra base burning behind them. It was probably from the explosions but he felt so weird he wasn’t sure. Steve stopped and braced himself against a tree. Men were walking past them, giving Steve curious looks and saluting him for saving them. Bucky was suddenly next to him. “You okay? Did you get hurt?”

“No. Don’t think so. Maybe it’s the adrenaline wearing off. I just need a second.” He fumbled in his jacket, took out his hormone pills and swallowed a few dry. Bucky raised a brow.

“I thought you were perfect now?”

Steve shrugs and pushes off the tree. “Close enough.” It feels farther and farther from the truth everyday. Bucky puts a hand on Steve’s back, just the middle of his back, a barely there touch and Steve stumbles. He holds out a hand to keep Bucky back. “Don’t touch me.”

Bucky huffs out a familiar, unhappy breath, then forces a practiced smile. “You got it, pal,” he says, easy as anything. It’s Bucky’s trademark response to Steve’s rejection. And it’s horrible.

“No, that isn’t what I mean. I just…I might throw up. I’d hate to be sick on you.”

“Well, I don’t want you to be sick on me, either. But, you did just save my life so I’ll forgive a little vomiting if it comes to that. Can’t be worse than that time we came back from the beach and you’d eaten hot dogs and snow cones. My ma didn’t even try to wash those trousers, just threw them out because of the color.”

“Those pants were two inches too short for you, anyway. She threw them out because you outgrew them.”

Bucky chuckles. “Maybe.” He’s looking at Steve with so much worry on his face. Steve starts walking again. He can’t look at Bucky right now. “God. Just look at you. You must be so happy. And a dominant now to boot. Makes sense, I guess.” Steve wants to ask why it makes sense but he knows. They both know. Steve’s constant rejection of Bucky, the way he always stood up for himself, “Wonder if it was there the whole time, some latent part of you.”

“Latent?”

Bucky snorts. “Yeah. Spent a week in a foxhole with a Brit who used to teach English at Oxford. Never said an easy word when a complicated one would do. Funny as hell.”

“Maybe when we get passes to London we can meet him for a drink.” Steve only says it because jealousy is simmering through him. Who is this guy who made Bucky laugh and got to be close to him for a week?

Bucky is quiet for a moment. “Don’t say stuff like that in front of the other guys, Steve. He’s dead. Anytime someone mentions someone, you assume they’re dead and don’t ask questions or say anything to rile anyone up. Sometimes soldiers gotta talk about stuff and sometimes they don’t…. Being out here is a weird mix of intimacy and disregard.”

Steve thinks about that for the rest of the walk. Those aren’t Bucky’s words. He’s gotten them from someone else. He doesn’t ask who.

Steve can’t stop looking at Bucky as they walk back to base. And Bucky keeps looking at him, too. It makes him feel warm inside, happy, and then he realizes Bucky is looking at the new him, trying to update his idea of Steve. “Captain America. Who the hell would have thought it. Well, I guess it makes sense. Who else would let the government experiment on them just to go to war?”

“I did my part,” Steve says, because that’s what he always says. It sounds even more hollow than usual.

“Yeah. I guess you did.” One of the guys comes over to talk to Bucky and Bucky slips back, lets the distance between them grow. Steve isn’t alone for long. Everyone wants to talk to Captain America. Everyone wants to thank him. They want his autograph and they want to hear stories of other daring rescues. He smiles as best he can and prays they get back to camp soon.

And then they make it back and Peggy is there in camp and she’s giving him a look. He knows what that means- she’s got his supply from Howard. His dosages are still changing, increasing almost every week now. 

Bucky makes them all cheer for him and because he’s a traitorous and sneaky bastard he slinks away while Steve is trapped with all these people.

He catches sight of Bucky leaving camp and runs to catch up to him. “Bucky! Where are you going?”

Bucky turned back, looked Steve up and down and then pasted on a smile. “There’s a river, bout a mile away,” Bucky said, his gaze directed towards Steve’s mouth. Steve licked his lips and Bucky blinked, cheeks turning pink. “If I can’t get a real shower than I’ll take what I can get.”

“Oh,” Steve said, unable to think of a way to invite himself. Which was stupid. Bucky is his best friend in all the world. Can’t he just go along? Steve doesn’t want to let him out of his sight. “I’m still covered in soot and worse from the base.”

Bucky hesitated, but finally shrugged. “Sounds like you should come along then.”

He was so relieved he took a step closer and then another until he was swaying into Bucky’s personal space and Bucky took a step back.

He gave Steve a look and Bucky gestured for them to go, making the universal open palmed gesture that meant Steve should go first. Steve smiled at him, took a step and out of the corner of his eye saw Bucky’s hand change course, like he was going to press it against Steve’s lower back. Bucky sighed, dropped his hand and realized Steve had seen him. “Sorry. Old habits. Guess I better really be careful now or you’ll deck me,” he said, trying to make a joke out of it.

Old habits. Steve tried very hard not to dwell on that statement and all it could mean. “I wouldn’t punch you,” he said, offended Bucky would think that.

He shrugged like it didn’t matter much to him either way. Sometimes Bucky was pretty hard to offend. “I’ll make sure it doesn’t get tested,” he said, conciliatory as ever. Bucky looked at him for a long second and then whistled. “Well, Rogers. They sure did a number on you. Congratulations.”

Steve blushed, ran a hand down his flat stomach absently. “You look different now that we’re the same height.”

Bucky raised a brow. “I don’t think we are the same height, pal. I think you’re taller than me. Anyway, I can’t help but think this is everything you ever wanted, so I’m happy for you.”

“What does that mean?” he asked, as they slowly walked away from camp. Because he was pretty sure Bucky _didn’t_ sound happy for him.

“You know. You’re not sick. You get to be here. People look up to you. You have purpose…and you’re dominant now, too. Welcome to the club,” he said, with a forced chuckle.

Steve felt a little sick. “So, you can tell?”

“Well, yeah. People react to you differently. Must be weird being riled up all the time. I remember those first couple of years after I came into my designation. I wanted to fight and fuck all the time. Sometimes at the same time.” His smile was crooked.

Steve reached into his pocket and swallowed another pill while Bucky was staring into the middle distance. They worked fast. But he was still half hard and he’d taken three times his usual dosage since he broke Bucky out. It was all he could do not to throw himself at him and…what? Then what would he do?

“And, everyone is practically falling all over themselves to be on your team,” he said, chuckling. “Not that I blame them. Jesus, you’re Captain Fucking America!” he practically shouted. He clapped Steve on the back then dropped his hand. Steve’s shoulder tingled weirdly and a shiver went through him, making his balls ache warningly. He’d need to jerk off soon. There was no getting around it. 

“But, do I like…act different or smell different or…. I don’t even know. But it’s gotta be something, right? I mean, you know me better than anyone. When you are next to me you feel like I’m a dominant? You can tell?” he asks, almost scared of the question and definitely scared of the answer.

He takes a while to answer. “Well, you’ll need to say it with more conviction then that.” Bucky shrugged. He was running his tongue absently along his lower lip, a nervous habit he sometimes did when he was thinking really hard. “I guess it’s…how you look? How others respond to you? Everyone is treating you like you are. They all see it.”

“That’s not you, though. I don’t care what random strangers think. Fuck, Bucky you’re the only person….”

He wants to cry. He’s worried it’s going to happen. Bucky puts a hand on his arm, sensing his distress as he always does, although it’s admittedly pretty easy right now. “Hey. You’re okay. You’re still you, Stevie. I see you,” he says, reassuringly. He squeezes Steve’s arm and once again he let’s go. He wants to yell at Bucky to touch him already. To stop being so careful. Why did Bucky touch him when he was breakable and weak but now that he’s strong he treats Steve like he’s glass? Or gross. 

“Sometimes, I’ll meet someone who’s pretty high S or D and I can feel it. I dislike them on sight or get all annoyed with them.”

“Even the S’s?”

“Well, no, not exactly _annoyed_. I’m sure you know how that goes. They must have sent you an S girl or three by now.” Steve nods. He can’t speak through the lump in his throat. He isn’t like Bucky, the proof keeps piling up. Then what is he?

He’s giving Steve a look, almost concerned or curious. “I’m sure I’ll pick up more stuff soon. I’m going to say that being recently tortured has taken a toll on my dominance assessing abilities. Just because you feel the same to me doesn’t mean anything.”

Steve didn’t like that answer. Something like grief going rolled through him. “You saying you’re going tobe annoyed with me pretty soon? Dislike me?”

Bucky stopped, put a hand on his bicep, winced and dropped it to Steve’s forearm, just a light squeeze and then gone. Steve swallowed hard so he didn’t moan at the touch. He wanted to bury himself against Bucky’s chest, breathe him in, filthy, tortured and all. 

“No, Stevie. I don’t think I could ever dislike you. It’s not possible.”

“You don’t know that. Maybe it takes time or something.”

“Stop it. Stevie, you’re still you. Still my best friend and a regular old pain in my ass.”

And then they were at the river. They stripped off at the water’s edge, able to hear a few guys further down the way and some birds chirping as the sun set. But, all Steve could really think about was Bucky undressing beside him. Would Bucky look at him to see just how much Steve’s body had changed? And what would he think? He certainly wouldn’t find it as attractive as his small, more submissive frame he’d used to have. Steve couldn’t imagine that giant submissives were a thing anyone particularly wanted.

Bucky whistled when the shirt came off. “How do I get me some serum? Jesus, Stevie, your muscles have muscles.” Steve blushed. “Is it weird? All the changes?”

People asked him that all the time. He usually deflected. It wasn’t anyone’s business and it seemed like everyone expected him to be so grateful, to look back on who’d he’d been as something useless and worthless. No one understood that he’d lost parts of himself, too.

But, this was Bucky and if anyone was going to get an honest attempt out of Steve to answer the question, it was him. “I forget how heavy I am sometimes. And uh, how tall. I’ve run into a few walls because I think there’s room but my shoulders are too wide.”

Bucky shook his head, laughing quietly. Steve felt himself break out into gooseflesh as Bucky looked back at him, assessing, examining each piece of him, from the muscles of his stomach to his neck. He wanted Bucky to like him like this, he realized. Maybe even more than he needed to like himself. Bucky’s approval suddenly seemed like the only thing that mattered. He shifted on his feet, trying to stand a little taller.

“Don’t worry, pal. It’s still you and you look great.”

“How…how did you know what I was thinking?”

“I’m a genius. And you’re all fidgety and uncomfortable,” he said, voice dropping a little lower. “Like you, um, need to be settled or something,” He waved a hand like he was clearing the very idea away.

Bucky undid his pants and dropped them then strode towards the water. Steve looked at Bucky’s back, at the muscles of his legs, the way his ass flexed and he felt his own body responding in a way it hadn’t before.

_Ever._

He thought he’d known what lust was. Lust was getting a hand on himself or how he felt in the morning when he woke up hard.

But, seeing Bucky naked and so fucking strong was like seeing everything in color when he’d only known black and white. And compared to before the serum? It was like he’d only known radio with a horrible reception. There was a whole spectrum of desire out there and he hadn’t understood it in the slightest. It was absolutely terrifying.

He finished undressing, cock hard and red, wading into the chilly water, worried Bucky would look at him and make some comment. But, Bucky didn’t turn around until Steve was all the way in, some vague illusion of modesty being preserved. The freezing cold helped a little but not nearly enough. Bucky dunked himself under the water and lathered up the bar of soap Steve hadn’t realized he’d been carrying. He began to wash himself, cheeks a little flushed, attention studiously not on Steve.

“Here?” he asked, holding it out. Steve blushed, soaped up hishands, thinking about how Bucky had just touched the soap.

“Your back is all bruised,” Steve said, seeing it under the dirt and now that he was close.

“Could have been worse.” It was worse, but Bucky didn’t say that.

“Will you…will you let me wash your back? Or would that hurt too much?” he asked, and was so embarrassed he couldn’t look him in the face. Bucky turned towards him, waited until Steve lifted his face up and made eye contact. Jesus, Jesus it was all too fucking much.

“You want to?” Bucky finally asked.

“Well, not if it’s weird or you don’t want me to.”

“Uh huh. Sure, go for it,” he said, like it wasn’t a big deal, after all. Bucky turned around, presenting Steve with his back. Steve took a step closer, breathing suddenly more difficult. His hands actually shook as he raised them towards Bucky and for a moment he thought he wouldn’t be able to touch him. His cock had softened a little bit because of the cold but now he was hot everywhere, throbbing and he didn’t know how hewas going to get out of this river without coming at least once.

“Will you, uh, hold the bar?” he asked, soaping his palms. A hand came out of the water, palm up and waiting. “Thank you,” he murmured, and Bucky’s shoulders stiffened. 

“Why are you thanking me? You’re the one who’s about to do all the work.” He asked, sounding bewildered. Clearly that was not something dominant Steve should do.

“Shut up,” Steve managed, but his heart was thudding and he had to reach under the water and pull sharply on his balls before he could even think to touch Bucky. This was a mistake. He carefully put the soap in Bucky’s large palm so it didn’t slide off and get lost in the water. 

His fingers touched Bucky’s palm and he found himself inhaling audibly as sensation zinged through him, electric and sharp. Bucky’s palms had calluses and Steve stroked one absently with his index finger, felt the difference in texture, wanted those hands on him. He brushed three fingers against Bucky’s hand and Bucky shrugged his shoulders like something was crawling on him.

“Steve,” Bucky said, voice low with command. Steve jerked his hand away, put his hands on Bucky’s back and then just stopped for a moment, taking it all in, the smooth skin so damp and wet, the tension in his shoulders. He slid his hands up and down the smooth skin, feeling each muscle and indentation, his attention instantly narrowed in with total focus on Bucky.

He pressed his fingers in carefully and then glided his palms against the slabs of flesh and muscle. Steve found himself moving a little closer, his fingers cupping more, squeezing and sliding over the skin covetously. He was gentle with the bruising, as gentle as he could be with the fierce need for more pounding through him.

The hunger grew with each pass. He wanted to touch more of him,_ feel _more of him. And Bucky’s neck was right there, smooth and silken. His hand went up, fingers gentle as they went up the cord of his neck. His lips were close, so close and he exhaled and watched goosebumps break out on Bucky’s skin. Bucky shifted forward, took a step away from him.

“I think you better stop now,” Bucky said, quiet.

_Please let me. _It was on the tip of his tongue. And it was the ‘please’ that saved him from doing something spectacularly stupid. He’d spent so many years _not_ saying that particular word to Bucky, keeping himself separate and aloof from anything that might encourage Bucky’s designation, that it would have been easier to yell ‘fire’ in a crowded building than to say please.

He withdrew his hands, wiped what was left of the suds on his own arms as if that might be some poor substitute to actually rubbing Bucky’s flesh. Bucky turned slowly, an expression of confusion on his face. “I think I need a minute. Meet you back at camp?”

He wanted to protest. “Sure, Buck. Of course.”

Bucky walked out of the water and away from him, got dressed and didn’t even turn around to say goodbye, just disappeared back the way they’d come. Steve didn’t hesitate. He wrapped a hand around his hard cock and jerked off like he used to. He got closer to coming then he had in months but still that edge of orgasm was elusive. He groaned in frustration and switched his grip, contemplated dropping the soap so he could put two hands on himself but soap wasn’t in supply and losing it was unthinkable.

He took a deep breath and waded to shore, throwing the soap onto the bank and gave himself a pep talk as he waded back into the water. He was going to come. He could do this.

He adjusted his grip again, dropping his hand lower, wrapped his thumb around the shaft and his fingers under his balls, jerked both at the same time. There was an unpleasant tug at the base of his shaft and his balls were pulled too hard and the uncomfortableness of it all felt good.

He rubbed the fingers of his other hand hard under his balls, pressed tight against his shaft, pulling down so it hurt, forcing the shaft away from his body. He couldn’t get off unless it hurt anymore. He came almost instantly. The orgasm went on for awhile, the pulses deeper and a bit longer.

Tears filled his eyes. He hadn’t come that hard in at least a month. The relief was short lived. A few minutes passed, his dick didn’t soften and he almost felt worse.

He kept stroking himself, widened his stance and finally had to give in to what his body really wanted. He let his fingers go back, pressed firmly against the tight ring of his hole, slipping a finger into himself and then another. The second one burned, something he’d found he really liked, and which had a tendency to make him come. Two fingers deep inside himself, palm shoved hard into his swollen perineum and he came again.

He sank under the water until his shoulders were covered. He breathed heavily, dazed and hopefully sated. He pulled his fingers out of his ass and tried to enjoy the calm. Was it over? He counted to twenty and then another twenty. He touched the head of his cock with his finger, gentle, almost tentative, desperately wanting it to be over. There was a little softness now but as soon as he touched himself his cock pulsed to hardness again, engorging so quickly there was a sting in his balls and his shaft.

Fuck this.

Steve gave himself another pep talk. He’d use both hands and this would be fine. Hadn’t he just come twice? One of them basically good and fairly easy? Of course he could do it again. He jerked his cock hard and worked his balls but after a few minutes the fear came back. Maybe it wasn’t going to happen. And that was dangerous. Fear was always trying to consume him.

It didn’t take much to convince him he was going to stay hard and hurting forever. To lose momentum and doubt his ability to come. The amount of times he’d just given up, had to inject medication directly into his scrotum to make the problem go away was growing. Every time he resorted to the injection, the longer it took for him to feel healthy again. Nauseous, weak and chilled, sometimes a fever. His body didn’t like the drugs.

There wasn’t an alternative. His cock was a curse. Too huge and overly engorged. He hated it. He’d probably have to do the injections this time, too. And how long would that get him? At first it had gotten him five glorious days of not being hard all the damned time. Then it went to three. Would he get 12 hours?

Steve got out of the water and gave himself the injection. He sat down and waited for it to work. When his cock was finally soft and he got back to his feet, his legs were shaky and his head hurt. Already. 

He got dressed and sat down for a few more minutes, dry heaved a little and then forced himself to go back to camp. One foot in front of the other. He could do this.

****

“Captain Rogers. You don’t look well,” Agent Carter said as soon as he was back in camp.

“I’m fine. Been a long couple of days is all.”

Her smile was sharp and red. “Well, you should have a few days to recuperate. We’re waiting for provisions before anyone goes anywhere.”

“What do you mean waiting for provisions?”

She looked cautiously around them to make sure they weren’t being overheard. “Everything is delayed. The plane carrying your shipment was shot down near Ireland. Another one has been dispatched. Shouldn’t be more than 24 hours.”

He tried to do the math in his head. If things went to absolute shit would he be okay? He had two injections left and 12 pills. He’d taken 4 today already. “Thank you for letting me know,” he said.

She was staring at his biceps again. She’d already propositioned him once. She wasn’t submissive but she certainly wouldn’t object to a ‘vigorous night of sex’ as she’d called it.

“Can I help you with something?” he asked, because he needed to get out of there and lie down.

“No, not especially. I just wanted to say hello. You should be getting a pass for London soon. A reward for freeing our soldiers. Maybe I’ll see you there.”

He smiled and nodded, said something that was hopefully coherent and went to his tent, focused on lying down. He opened the flap and was momentarily startled to see Bucky sitting in his chair, reading a book. His cheeks were flushed. He’d come and come hard. Steve wasn’t sure why he was so convinced but he was. He almost stumbled. A weird combination of jealousy mixed with fury rolled through him

“You alright? You look awful,” Bucky said, getting to his feet.

“Just need a rest. Sorry. Wake me for food?”

“Will do. Want me to clear out?”

“No. Definitely not,” he said, and dropped down to his bedroll. He’d invited Bucky to share his space and even though it might be inconvenient if he needed to jerk off, it was worth it to have Bucky with him. He pressed his face into the pillow and breathed deep. “Yeah, feel better already,” he muttered. And it was so true he groaned, as every horrible sensation and pain began to gently recede like water slipping back into the tide. God, the relief he felt made his eyes water.

“You’re on my bedroll, punk. Move over. I don’t need your super drool all over my pillow.”

That forced him awake. He pushed up, looked at the bed. “I’ll be damned.” He moved over and laid on his own bed. It was horrible. It smelled musty and was scratchy. “What if I commandeer your bed?”

“Very funny.”

“I’m serious,” he said, tilting his head to see Bucky. A pain behind his eyes began to beat in time with his heart. His hand slid over without thinking about it, touching Bucky’s bed, wanting to be there.

Bucky gazed narrowly at him. “It doesn’t bother you? My bed roll has seen a hell of a lot more use than yours.It ain’t clean. Can’t smell good. Might get up and walk away on its own one of these days.”

“So, I’d be doing you a favor.” He shifted back over, taking it as permission, wrapped his arms around the makeshift pillow when his head was settled. He heard Bucky put the book down, the soft footfalls as he came closer. He got down onto the ground and lay down on Steve’s bedroll, turned his head, sniffed the pillow and Steve forced himself to turn back and make eye contact.

“You _really_ want my bed?”

All he could do was nod. Because it was now donning on him how weird this was. How unnatural. A dominant didn’t like another dominant’s scent. Certainly wouldn’t want to steep himself in it and find it therapeutic. Weirdly enough his cock finally went completely soft and that was terrifying as well but in a different way. What did it mean that being next to Bucky was enough to soothe him, make him feel better, was somehow even responsible for his lust?

_I’m scared. _It took everything in him not to say it aloud. Bucky saw some of it on his face, though. “You’re alright, Stevie.”

Bucky raised a hand, hovering it over Steve’s cheek for a long moment, giving him time to object. He shook his head minutely and Bucky’s hand lowered, ran through Steve’s hair gently and then pulled back. He flexed and relaxed his hand, frowned down at it. He’d seen that gesture more than a few times over the years and now he wondered what it meant. What Bucky was feeling when he touched Steve that made him stare at his hand like it personally offended him.

“Stevie, you can’t tell anyone we switched. You know that, right?” Bucky sounded worried, his voice soft, like someone might be listening. He should tell Bucky never mind. But giving the bed up was beyond him. He turned over instead, pulled the cover up higher so it was just under his nose and fell fast asleep.

***

When he awoke Bucky was back in the chair, book open. He smiled cautiously at Steve. “How do you feel?”

“Good. I haven’t slept that good since Brooklyn.”

“Ah. That makes sense.”

Steve got up, put his boots back on, his stomach growling hungrily. Had he taken off his boots? “What does?”

“Why you like my scent.” He was pretty sure Bucky had been worrying over it the entire time he’d been asleep.

“Do you not like mine?” Steve asked, horrified by the possibility that Bucky might think he stank.

“I shouldn’t like it. But I, uh, I don’t mind it and I was wondering about it myself but you’re right, it’s like home. Cause we were each other’s home, you know? Even though you’re dominant now, I think my body recognizes you like you were before. When you weren’t a threat.”

“Huh.” Was that why he was reacting so strongly to Bucky? Because of his pre-conditioning or past history? It made sense. Perfect sense. It was in fact probably the only way twodominants would be able to stand each other in such close quarters. Because, yeah, his body should think of Bucky as a threat. At least a little.

They left the tent and Bucky went to eat dinner with the men while Steve got dragged off to have dinner with some visiting generals and Peggy. Here he was, finally at the front line, having liberated prisoners and saved the day, and he was still little better than a dancing monkey. Now he just performed for less people.

Bucky was surrounded instantly,men slapping him on the back and dragging him into various hugs. His popularity was no surprise, Bucky had always drawn people to him. He watched Bucky go, part of a group, an obvious leader, someone who fit in, and once again he was left behind.

He didn’t get back until late. Bucky was asleep when he got back but happily enough he’d taken Steve’s bedroll. He stripped down as much as he was willing to and lay down.

“You awake?” he asked.

“No,” Bucky said, instantly. His voice was muffled through Steve’s pillow.

“How was dinner?”

“You’re a punk.”

“Want me to tellyou about _my_ dinner?”

“Steven Grant Rogers if you tell me how good your meal was while I had something that literally tried to crawl off my plate and complete it’s evolution into a new life form, I will pummel you.”

Huh. What would that be like? Getting pummeled by Bucky. He made himself push the thought as far away as he could. “There’s talk of sending me elsewhere.”

Bucky propped up onto an elbow. His hand reached out, fisted into Steve’s shirt like he would physically keep him there. A strange breathlessness went through Steve at the rough grip. “What do you mean? Where? When?”

“I’m not sure. London, maybe. I was surprised, too. I shouldn’t be. But, I guess I thought I’d get to stay here with you.Stupid, huh?”

Bucky snorted. “This is war, Steve. No one gets to be where they want or with who they want.”

“I know that. Of course I know that,” he said, annoyed. He pulled out of Bucky’s grip.

“Do you? You aren’t special, Steve. No Nazi is going to ask you who you are before he shoots you. Being Captain America doesn’t mean you’re going to get out of the way of the shell if it’s got your name on it, or that you won’t die while you’re sitting on the can. You go where the brass want you to go and that’s all there is to it. If you get to go to London and not get bombed, be grateful.”

“Fuck you,” Steve said, vehement. Tears filled his eyes instantly and he rolled away from him.

“Jesus, Stevie. _Steve_. I’m not trying to be an asshole, I’m trying to tellyou what I’ve learned since I’ve been here. I should be dead. You stay here long enough and you’ll be dead. I’m on borrowed time and you ain’t. You are golden and perfect and there is a very good chance you’re going to make it out of here alive if you play your cards right. How could I not want that for you?”

“You mean if I cower and perform and kiss ass in the safety of London or New York?”

“Hey. I don’t give a shit where they send you so long as it’s safe.”

He wiped his eyes surreptitiously against Bucky’s former pillow. Steve knew he should keep his mouth shut. He was too emotional. But the thought of being sent away from Bucky, of leaving him here to die made him reckless. “I can’t bear to let you go again, Buck. How comeyou can let me go? Is it…this?” he didn’t say ‘my body’ because it seemed like a weird lie. It wasn’t his body, it was a body. His was gone.

“What? You being different?” Steve dragged in a shaky breath. Bucky put a hand in the center of Steve’s back like he used to, when he was sick and couldn’t breathe. “Don’t fish for compliments. Take the out.”

With a furious hiss he turned over, fist flying towards Bucky’s face. Bucky caught his hand and Steve gasped. He shoved his body forward, rolling Bucky to his back and raised his other hand but Bucky caught that too and Steve pulled against him, trying to break free. Of course he could get away, he could feel how very easy it now was to break Bucky’s hold, and that was a new grief inducing realization he hadn’t even known he had to lose. “Fuck,” Steve said, devastated.

And all the sudden Bucky let him go. Steve was panting. He pushed himself up, looming over Bucky’s body. He threw a leg over him, sat down on Bucky’s groin and heard him make a small sound.

“You’re just full of bad ideas tonight, aren’t you?” Bucky whispered, low and dangerous.

“All this time I just wanted to get to you. And I did one better, I _saved_ you and you haven’t even said thank you.”

“Thank you. Now get the fuck off of me,” he said, quiet.

He didn’t. “We want to make it out of here, we do it together.”

“It’s good to see some things are still the same. I wasn’t sure. But you’re still as dumb and willing to run into a losing fight as you always were. Now get the ever loving fuck _off_ of me.”

“I’m going to save us. I’m going to get us through this damned war, even if I have to pull you along resentful and annoying as you are, the entire damned time.”

Bucky barked out a laugh. “I take it back. I’m _sorry_ you saved me. I’m _sorry_ I was still alive when you got there. I should have died. You don’t even know what they did to…us. To them and to me. You think I could live with myself if they got you, too? You aren’t staying out in this shit hole with me if I can help it. I don’t want that.”

Steve ground his teeth, thighs flexing as he gripped Bucky’s hips tight under him. Bucky shoved up to a sitting position, hand on Steve’s jaw, forcing him to look at him. Even in the pitch black, the shadow of Bucky was beautiful. His breath was warm on Steve’s face he was so close. “If my dying would keep you safe I’d eat my gun right now,” Bucky growled.

And then Steve slapped him, the crack of it loud in their tent. Steve shoved off of him, hand stinging, turned away from him again as he laid back down, shaky and unsettled.

“You want your bed back?” Bucky asked, dryly.

“You’re a damned fool, James Buchanan Barnes.”


	4. Chapter 4

Steve had meetings the next day until late afternoon. When he came back to his tent, the flap was open and he could hear Peggy talking to Bucky. “I’ve known him all his life,” he heard Bucky say, annoyed.

“You’ve known Steve Rogers all your life. This is Captain America we’re talking about.”

“Well, I’m pretty sure that any drugs you’re going to give to Captain America are going to wind up in the same place they would have if you’d given em to Steve Rogers if you know what I mean.”

“I’ll find him later,” she says, and Steve goes inside the tent. Bucky rolls his eyes, wanting Steve to know how much Peggy annoys him. They’ve only just met but he’s pretty sure they dislike each other intensely.

“Ah, Captain Rogers. There you are. Your package arrived. Shall I keep it in the main office?”

“No, I’ll take it,” he says, holding out his hand. It’s fairly small. She gives him the box, a list of contents on the front and after a moment’s confirmation of the dinner meeting she leaves.

“Pretty sure she’d be a lot nicer to me if you fucked her brains out,” Bucky murmured.

“Don’t be crude.”

“Fine. Go make love to her,_ hard_, so she gets off my case.”

“She isn’t a submissive,” he says, and feels heat creeping up his face.

Bucky throws him a look. “So? She wants you. You want her. Pretty sure she’ll let you give it to her however you want to. It may not be amazing but I’m sure it will be damned good.”

“You sound pretty sure,” he says, hoping the conversation can end now. Should he tell Bucky he doesn’t want Peggy? He’s not sure how that would help anything.

Bucky shrugs and stands up. “When you’re a thirsty man in the desert the water is good even if it’s warm.” He’s still looking at Steve. But with confusion since Steve is also looking at him with confusion. Bucky explains his metaphor. “Because, it’s better if it’s cold. It’d be better if she was submissive but sex is still good if you’re attracted to your partner.”

“Yeah,” he agrees, gaze sliding away from Bucky.

There’s a long pause and he can practically feel Bucky putting it all together. “Are you going to see the submissives before they leave tomorrow?”

“Are you?”

“Yeah. I was there yesterday and due to the torture I’m actually able to go back for another round.”

Rage and jealousy, helplessness, so many horrible emotions go through him at the thought of Bucky with a submissive. “The idea of sloppy seconds doesn’t really appeal to me.”

Bucky crosses his arms, comes closer to Steve and whatever Bucky’s now thinking it’s worse. He can feel some emotion radiating off of Bucky. “What the fuck are you doing with yourself? You haven’t seen a submissive _once_? How are you coping?”

“You don’t know that I haven’t seen one.”

“I do know that if you think it’s all sloppy seconds. That’s not how it works.”

“Then how the hell does it work?”

“You meet them and talk about what gets you off. They tell you how far they’re willing to go. Some poor bastards just get to boss them around a little and have to finish off on their own. In that case, she’ll give a dominant meds so he gets more out of it. But, usually, both parties want each other. It’s not like their prostitutes or something. It isn’t all that often that one of them will offer to fuck you. And it isn’t all that often that you would accept.”

This doesn’t make any sense. “You did. Yesterday.”

Bucky flushes and looks sheepish. “Yeah. But, I’d just been tortured and liberated. Pretty sure she was willing out of pity.”

Steve doubts that. And that isn’t the point. “Yeah, but you said yes.”

“So?” Something flares through Bucky’s eyes. Anger. “Just because you’re apparently living like a saint doesn’t mean I have to.”

“I’m not saying you have to live like a saint.”

“Remember all those years, so many _god damned years_, where you told me to go find a submissive and get off so I wouldn’t badger you?” The words are practically thrown at Steve, they have weight and darkness. A long history of emotional baggage.

Steve backs up a step. “Buck, I’m sorry—“

“No. Shut _up_. You don’t get to be pissed or throw a fit or whatever the hell it is you’re doing now. You aren’t my dominant and if you fucking try I’ll god damned deck you.”

“What? No. Buck, I would never.” It’s actually so far from the truth it would almost be funny if it wasn’t so tragic.

“Get your meds sorted out, you hear me?”

“Oh. Right. I want to. I’m trying…. Sorry.”

Now Bucky looks devastated. He blows out a breath, walks away and comes back again. “Fuck. I’m sorry. We’re both on edge. I’m taking it out on you. This isn’t your fault. It’s tough. Tell me, um, tell me what regimen they’ve got you on.”

“Don’t apologize. I’m sorry, too.” If Bucky wants to think this is because of their dominance clashing or whatever then fine. That’s probably as good a conclusion as any. And, hey, there’s an infinitesimally small chance it’s true.

Bucky grabs him, hauls him into a hug and Steve bites down hard on his tongue to get through it without saying something stupid or dropping to his knees. Bucky lets him go. “You really getting your pills specially from Howard Stark? That can’t be good.”

“We don’t need to talk about it,” he says, because it’s too close to a lot of things he doesn’t want to talk about with Bucky. Ever.

“Stevie. You’re my best friend and I care about you more than just about anyone. I thought maybe it was me at first, or something from being tortured, but, um, you don’t smell right. And you’ve got syringes in your bag. You need to talk to me.”

“You went through my bag?”

“Not intentionally. There was a chance for laundry and I knew you’d want your stuff cleaned. Why are you injecting dominant hormones into yourself?”

Steve feels sick. How does he explain this? He collapses down into a chair and after a good minute of neither of them moving or saying anything, Bucky prowls up to him, literally walks up to him with such an asshole swagger Steve almost moans. Bucky puts a finger under his chin so Steve has to look up and meet his gaze. Bucky looks at his lips, slowly drags his gaze back up to Steve’s eyes and stares at him until Steve looks down. The heat of a blush rolls over his skin. He’s dizzy again and his cock is hard. He’s trembling. “If you weren’t all fucked out on drugs you’d have hit me by now.”

It takes a minute for the words to register. Steve’s mouth is watering and he wants to be lower, down on the ground between Bucky’s legs with Bucky’s cock pressing deep into Steve’s mouth. How would he offer to do that? He’s about to reach for him, is thinking about moving his head and licking Bucky’s thumb that’s near his mouth.

“What?” he says, and jerking his chin out of Bucky’s grip. He stands. Tries to stand, has to put a hand down on the desk to keep himself stable.

Bucky just looks worried now. “Steve, you are not okay. I know you were never comfortable with your body or whatever but now that you’re dominant that has to change. You have to take care of yourself. Whatever they’re giving you isn’t calibrated right.”

“You’re not a doctor.”

“You’re taking my bed roll. You climbed on top of me last night. You smell like—“

“What?”

Bucky licks his lips, his eyes are a little wide. “You smell like a submissive in distress. To me. Underneath all of it, that’s what I smell and…fuck. Stevie, you let me come up to you like that, touch you and you dropped your gaze. That isn’t right. I’m sorry,” he says, and Steve doesn’t doubt that he means it.

“Are you saying I’m not dominant?” Fuck, he doesn’t know if he wants Bucky to say it or not. Maybe he does. Maybe it would be better if someone just said it. Could things get any worse?

“No, of course not. I’m just saying….look, this isn’t you. You weren’t born with this designation. This was forced upon you and maybe it’s like the running into door frames because you forget how big your body is now. You need to see a submissive. You need to let her take care of you or something. Maybe see another doctor.”

“I can’t. I don’t know how and I don’t _want_ to.” And ain’t that the saddest fucking part of all of this. Because the idea of some woman trying to get him hard and please him sexually sounds awful. It makes his stomach turn and it makes him want to vomit. Stress pounds through him, fear does too, and all of those feelings eat through the hormones he takes. Steve takes in a breath and he can smell Bucky, feel him and his energy crackling around him.

Fuck, why can’t he just get down on his knees for him? He can’t do this anymore, he just can’t. And he falls, absolutely just collapses down to the ground. He buries his forehead against Bucky’s thigh, the big, hard muscle of his thigh and tears are flowing down his cheeks. And he’s hard now. Unbearably and horribly hard and he can tell from the ache of it, the way he’s beginning to shake that this is going to be a bad one. There isn’t even any point in attempting to jerk off.

“It’s a nightmare. I hate it. I hate this body and I hate myself. I wish it was over. If I could go back—“ which is stupid to even think about because he can’t. And, because he’d make the decision all over again if it meant saving Bucky. “Of course I’d pay any price to have you, Bucky, but fuck it’s hard.”

“Stevie,” he says, and he grabs the chair, moves back to get it next to Steve and sits down in it. Steve whimpered when he pulled away, is looking at him with blurry tear-filled eyes. Bucky cups Steve’s face in his hands, wipes his cheeks with his thumbs and pulls Steve’s head down to his leg again.

“It’s alright, sweetheart. I promise you. It will be okay.” Which is utter bullshit. “We’ll get you through it. Do you want me to help you?”

“Please. Yes, Fuck. I do.” The words explode out of him. He swallows hard. “Would you get the package from the desk?” he begs, a little delirious.

Bucky makes a noise in his throat. “That isn’t what I meant. I meant with the submissive. We could talk to her together. Make sure you’re on the same page. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. It’s just new.”

_Oh god_. He’d thought Bucky meant he’d stay here while Steve took his pills and did his shot. He’d thought Bucky was offering to let Steve stay between his legs and take comfort from him while he tortured himself.

Because, the idea of having to do the shot is practically beyond him. His body is desperate to avoid it. The mere thought of touching the syringe makes him want to throw up. He doesn’t know if he can press the needle into his flesh and push the plunger, force that poison into his body again.

What will happen to him if he does nothing? Would he go into a coma like before? Would he die? He presses his face further against Bucky, between his legs and into the crevice of his thigh and groin so he can cry and have it be muffled. Bucky is so warm here. So hot. He feels drunk and needy. Bucky’s hand is on his shoulder, pushing him like he’s trying to keep Steve away from his groin.

“Steve. Stop. _Steve_.”

“I’ll do anything. Please, just let me be here. I just want it to be over,” his voice is as dead as he feels. And just like that the panic leaves him. He’s flat and vacant. He can’t get up. He can’t do anything.

“Fuck. Now I’m even more worried. Let me get your pills, sweetheart. Hold on a minute.” Bucky pushes Steve back and gets up, goes to the desk. He gets the package open and then gets water for Steve before he comes and sits back down.

“Okay. The pills. How many?”

Answering is fucking difficult. “I don’t know. What’s the dosage?”

A long pause as Bucky reads Stark’s writing. “This is a fucking horse pill. It says to take one.”

“Then give me two.”

“That’s not how you’re supposed to take medicine.”

He laughs miserably. “Then just wait til you see how I take the next one.”

Bucky is hesitating. He holds out one pill to Steve. “Take the one to start with. Here you go.”

Steve takes the pill from Bucky’s hand and drinks water to get it down. “Just like the good old days, huh? Me near death and you to pick up the pieces.”

“You’re not near death.” But Bucky doesn’t sound all that sure. “How do you do the shot?”

“Oh fuck. I don’t want it.” Bucky pets his hair, squeezes his legs so Steve’s shoulders are compressed, supported. He feels cared for, protected. The hand in his hair gets a little heavier, he presses his short nails into Steve’s scalp and Steve’s cock spasms at how good it is. He cries out, knows his underwear is a little damp now.

“Did I hurt you?” Bucky asks, quietly.

“No.”

Bucky doesn’t say anything for a moment and then his fingers slide through Steve’s hair to the base of his skull and he presses in firmly, Steve’s forehead mashed against his thigh. God, how good would it feel if he could bury his face in Bucky’s crotch while he did this?

Steve trembles and Bucky makes a soothing sound then presses harder, harder and something is happening deep inside Steve, he’s coiling tighter and tighter, wound up and speechless with it. He’s going to explode, he’s going to come. Just a little tighter, a little longer, the focus of Bucky’s will over him, making him….Bucky let’s go with a gasp. “Fuck. Sorry.”

If he could speak he’d beg Bucky to never stop. Steve is panting hard. Bucky’s hand is in his hair and he tilts Steve’s head up to look into his face. Bucky’s cheeks are flushed. He peers at Steve, “Your eyes are blown wide.”

Steve blinks. “So are yours.”

Bucky shakes his head, clearly worried. Steve can feel him withdrawing. The agony in Steve’s cock grows and he bites his lip, chewing on the flesh hard.

“Stop! Christ, you’re bleeding.” Bucky looks like he’s about to cry. He presses a kiss to Steve’s forehead, hard and chaste. Like a promise or devotion.

“You’re okay. We’ll fix this. What’s the shot then?” Bucky picks up the pre-filled syringe, stares at it and the little cap covering the needle.

“You…you can’t watch me while I do it.”

“I can be right outside.”

“No.” He clears his throat. “I fucking hate it. I won’t be able to do it if you’re not here.”

Bucky blows out a breath. “Well, that’s a conundrum. Okay fine. Then I won’t look.” Bucky gives him a weak smile, trying to be supportive.

Steve nods. “Close your eyes.”

Bucky winces but obeys. Steve can’t do anything at first. He puts his head back down onto Bucky’s leg and Bucky’s leg jerks in surprise. “Sorry. You startled me.”

It’s kind of funny. It must be difficult for a dominant to have his eyes closed while someone is between his legs and he isn’t in control of what’s happening. Steve grips his cock through his pants. The wet spot is bigger than he thought.

“Promise you won’t look?” he asks, again.

“Yeah, Stevie. I promise.”

Steve presses his forehead into Bucky’s leg again, tries to breathe him in surreptitiously, desperate to believe Bucky won’t work out what he’s doing. Steve undoes his belt and Bucky’s thighs flex in response. Steve gets the button undone and even the zipper. He knows Bucky hears that because his inhale is loud.

Bucky crosses his arms, tucks his hands tight to his body like he’s trying to not touch Steve. He tilts his head back and Steve thinks it’s to remind himself to not look.

Steve has to move then, has to lift upwards so he can push his pants down his thighs. He takes his pants and underwear down and rests for a long moment, head much closer to Bucky’s groin then it was a minute ago. He’s touching himself with one hand, looking from his dark red, angry cock to Bucky face and back again. At least his cock is leaking for a change.

Usually it looks red, angry and swollen but dry, all his come locked up inside him. Now it’s overflowing, ever so slowly leaking out of him. He reaches for his balls, cups them gently and they’re burningly warm and heavy. So heavy that lifting them in his hands feels good. It’s hard to stay quiet. He squeezes gently and swears. His cock spasms like there’s a knife inside and Bucky’s hand is back inhis hair, fist gripped hard and tight against his scalp as a small sound of pain slips out of him.

“I want to see what you’re doing,” he growls.

“No. I’m almost finished.” But that’s easier said then done. He uncaps the syringe and his hand is shaking. His body and his mind are rebelling and he’s swallowing hard, worried he’s going to retch and then Bucky’s going to open his eyes and see what he’s doing and then what? How can he look him in the face after that? And he doesn’t want Bucky to see his cock. It’s bigger than Bucky’s and that seems wrong, too.

Tears are falling again and he turns his face, wipes them onto Bucky’s pants before he can think about it. Bucky makes a sound in his throat. He puts both hands on Steve’s head, touching him soothingly. It’s like he’s talking to a scared child. “How can I help you, sweetheart?”

He shakes his head, he doesn’t know. Bucky can feel the answer. “You’re okay. It will be over fast. I know you can do this, babydoll.”

Can he? “What if I can’t?”

“We don’t even have to worry about it. You’re going to do this. You’re a good…you’re going to be good…for me. Isn’t that…” Steve’s shoulders shake as Bucky puts it all together. Bucky clears his throat, tries again. “Is that what you want, Stevie? To be good for me?”

More than he’s ever wanted anything. “Yeah. That’s what I want, Buck.” He hopes Bucky can hear it in his voice. Bucky’s hand moves from his hair to his jaw, slides along the skin and Steve drags in a harsh breath, shivering at the touch. Bucky’s fingers are near his lips and Steve is staring up at him, at the column of his throat. Bucky’s thumb slips across his bottom lip and Steve lets his lips part. He kisses Bucky’s thumb, lets his tongue lick Bucky’s skin and Bucky pulls away.

Bucky nods like everything is starting to make sense. He brings his damp thumb to his mouth and swipes it across his own lips, tasting Steve. Steve’s never been more turned on in his life. “Are you still alright, Steve?”

“Yeah, I’m good.”

Bucky leans forward in the chair, fists his hands into Steve’s clothing and hauls him close. Steve buries his face into Bucky’s neck and whimpers. “There you go,” Bucky says, oozing confidence. His voice is so good and soothing and rich that Steve is speechless.

His shoulders slump as Bucky’s will washes over him. “You’re fine. It’s that easy. You’re going to be a good boy and do what you need to do. I’m here for you. _I’ve_ got you. Come on now, sweetheart. Do this for me.”

He lets Steve go and Steve slumps back down to the ground, feels like a puppet with his strings cut. He leans against Bucky’s leg for support and stares at the syringe, confused. “Come on, sweetheart.”

Steve gets the needle lined up to the base of his shaft, on the underside right before his balls. He presses the plunger and it still fucking hurts. It’s still horrible and he’s sure he can feel the poison spreading through him. But at least it makes Bucky happy. He exhales slowly and Bucky praises him, tells him he’s proud of him and that he’s been perfect.

His cock softens. He lifts his head and pulls up his pants, buttons them and zips them but doesn’t bother with the belt. His head goes back to Bucky’s body but higher now, ear pressed against his stomach and the heat of him as he wraps his arms around him and cries.

“It’s going to be okay,” Bucky says.

They both know it’s a lie. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This may be the last chapter for a day or two. i have a lot of words but they're actually all pretty unsuable i think. Had a lot of trouble working out what the dynamic would be after this. Did Bucky help him to bed, did steve get called away on a mission? how much longer will this 'steve is a dominant' nonsense go on between them? how willing is bucky to jump in and help? IDK. Many starts have been made.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I worked it the fuck out. Words! BOOM! Now I have to clean my kitchen.

Steve could barely keep his eyes open as he sat through another infernal planning meeting. It was quite clear that he was supposed to be grateful to be included and have a good meal but Steve couldn’t care less.

Bucky had somehow gotten him to his bed and Steve had slept deeply. When he’d woken up Bucky was gone and he was just about late for his meeting.

He’d been sitting here for an hour and a half listening to a circular conversation about maps. Maps which had been found when a few men had stumbled upon an artillery gun and managed to take it.

Now there was a tentative plan to send some men out to do some reconnaissance and see how good the intel was. How many men was a question. How they should get there was another. If they should engage the enemy was also up for debate. And then their decision would get kicked up the chain of command and by the time it got back down to them again it might all be different or someone else might have been sent out.

And Steve didn’t care.

At all.

Right now, Steve was tired and he felt like shit and Bucky was in their tent and Steve could still feel the strength of his body and the way he’d spoken so sweetly to Steve.

Had Bucky’s voice always been like that? Had he always been so confident and calm and controlled? So willing to focus on Steve and so intuitive? Had Steve never noticed or was this something he now noticed because of the serum?

Steve dragged his attention back to the meeting. If he spent too long thinking about Bucky he’d get hard and be in the same fucking boat he’d been in before. No way could he deal with another injection right now.

“Are we in agreement?” Peggy asked, and the men all murmured and nodded and the meeting broke up. She called his name before he left so he had to wait for her. He pasted on a smile.

“You were very quiet.”

“I don’t feel all that well still.”

“Will you be alright for the mission?” she asked, not all that concerned, or interested in how he was feeling because Peggy wasn’t a particularly empathetic person as far as Steve could tell.

“What mission?”

Her smile was brittle. “Go to bed. We’ll discuss it tomorrow. 0800 in my office.” And then she was gone. Steve went to the bathrooms and brushed his teeth, got ready for bed and was disappointed to get back to his tent and see the light was already out.

“Do you need a light?” Bucky asked, voice coming from their bedrolls.

“No. I can see.”

“Another perk of the serum,” Bucky muttered, and Steve heard him shifting around in the bedding. Steve got out of his jacket and most of his clothes, leaving on only his boxers and a t-shirt. They were as safe as possible where they were and he could afford to relax and undress a little.

He got into bed and realized Bucky was facing him. Was that what the shuffling was about? He’d wanted to face Steve?

His stomach flip flopped unpleasantly. “I’m tired,” he said. Bucky was going to want to talk about what had happened earlier.

“I’m sure you are.” A pause. Bucky reached out and touched Steve’s shoulder. “Can I touch your face?”

“I’m not crying.” He can’t think of any other reason why Bucky would touch him.

“I didn’t think you were.”

“Oh. Sure. That’s…fine.” Bucky touched Steve’s face with the backs of his fingers. Gentle. It was like he was waiting for something. He brushed his index finger along Steve’s lips. “What do you think my reaction would be if you wanted to do this to me?”

Right. So this was a trap. “I don’t know.” Steve’s voice wavered. He knew. Bucky wouldn’t be this relaxed and accepting.

“What do you think your reaction to me doing this before the serum would have been?” Steve shakes his head miserably. He would have pulled away. He wouldn’t have allowed it. He’d have been strong enough to say no. And he very likely would have been a dick about it. 

And just like that he’s 18 again and his mother is dead and Bucky is wanting to take care of him and Steve needs to be strong and push him away.

Steve’s eyes squeeze closed and he tries to dredge up some strength. His voice wavers. “I know I should stop you. I get it. But, I’m so fucking _tired_, Bucky. And I’ve missed you and I just…. Can I tell you not to touch me tomorrow? Please?” If Bucky will just give him the night to sleep, he can face it in the morning. Probably. 

“Stevie, we need to have aconversation.” Bucky says, his voice rough.

“Pretty sure I don’t want to.”

Bucky sighs. “Yeah. I feel the same way, pal.”He stops touching Steve, draws his hand back and wipes his hand on the bed.

“Why do you always do that after you touch me? Wipe me off or look like you think I’m gross.”

“Do I?”

Steve nods. “You’ve done it for years.”

“Since I came into my designation?”

“I guess so.” Steve’s got the impression that Bucky knows exactly what he’s talking about.

“My hand always tingles after I touch you. Sometimes it’s like pins and needles, but not bad, and sometimes it’s like a shock. It doesn’t happen with anyone else.”

“Oh. And you don’t like it?”

“You being the only one in the entire world that makes me feel certain things and yet my touch leaves you cold? No, Steve, I don’t like it.” His voice is very flat. He sounds tired. Maybe annoyed.

“I’m sorry.”

He can just about see Bucky’s brow raising in the dark. “It’s not like you do it on purpose. It’s not really a big deal except that I’m not sure anyone else feels the same thing.”

“Do you want me to ask? When I go to the doctor next?”

“No, Steve. You shouldn’t ask.”

“Why not?”

Bucky blows out a breath. “I don’t think it’s supposed to happen. What if it only happens because we’re men?”

Which is the most dangerous and concrete thing he’s ever said about how he feels. Before Steve can process that statement Bucky has moved on like it’s nothing. “Look, Pal. Don’t hit me for asking because I’m not trying to be an asshole. I’m your best friend and I’m just trying to help—”

“That’s an ominous starting point.”

Bucky punches him gently in the arm. “Steve. Why do you think you’re dominant?”

“Wow. Going for the big questions, huh?” he tries to laugh. Bucky doesn’t laugh. He’s quiet. Waiting. “That’s, um, what they told me. It’s in my blood,” Steve manages. He shoves his hands under his head, turns just enough so he can smell more of Bucky on the pillow. Instinctively, he knows that Bucky’s scent is soothing…and probably shouldn’t be. Maybe it’s like Bucky’s tingling hand.

“And you’ve never been with a submissive?” The question is horribly gentle.

“No.”

“Have you ever wanted to?”

“I have not.” Thank god it’s dark because he must be red as a damned tomato.

“Well…don’t you think it’s weird that you’re taking all those hormones if you’re a dominant? They give me submissive hormones to take. You take the opposite of what you are. What you lack.”

“Yeah, but, that’s because I burn through my own. That’s what Stark said.”

“Stark. Not sure I’d trust his directions let alone his medical opinions.”

Steve chuckles. “Good point. But, it’s not just him. There’s lots of doctors and scientists looking at my blood, trying to recreate the serum, and they all agree.”

“Look, I’ll ask you once and try to never bring it up again, okay? Do you think you’re dominant?”

“I’m not… normal.”

Bucky huffs. “No one is _normal._ And, anybody who’s close to normal sure won’t be after this fucking war is over. But, that ain’t the answer to the question I asked you.”

“I think I’m more submissive than I’m supposed to be,” Steve says. He’d thought he was saying it because Bucky had asked and probably even deserved the truth after what he’d done for Steve earlier, but now that he’s said the hardest part he wants to tell Bucky all of it. “They say I’m changed. And at first, I think I didn’t know because I just hadn’t experienced much of anything before the serum, you know? I didn’t have a designation or have urges. I barely even thought about sex. I was just so sick all the time, you know?”

“Yeah, Steve. I know.” Steve’s hands are cold and he’s starting to tremble with emotion.

“Turn over,” Bucky orders, and Steve goes, wants to cry with relief when Bucky scoots closer and wraps an arm around him. He doesn’t do anything else, just waits, patient and strong behind him. Steve relaxes into him. The support at his back makes it easier to talk. Bucky just knows that, doesn’t he?

“It’s getting worse all the time. I take a hell of a lot of hormones to function. And the dosage required is just… it scares me. I don’t see how I can live like this. It isn’t sustainable.”

“You’re not usually afraid of needles.”

“No one usually jabs me in the scrotum,” he’s trying to make a joke of it. It doesn’t work.

Bucky is suddenly very tense behind him. “What?”

“I don’t want to talk about that right now,” he says, pushing his face into the pillow. He’d sort of thought Bucky knew. Maybe he’d looked or worked it out. Apparently not.

“Stevie, I thought it was your fucking thigh,” he says, and it’s that low dominant growl of a command Bucky’d sometimes get when things between them were getting bad. Once that tone of voice came out it was time for Bucky to find a submissive. Now it’s making Steve throb and ache, his whole body shivering in awareness. “You can’t ask me to leave that alone.”

Steve breaks out into goosebumps. He doesn’t want Bucky to go find a submissive. He picks up Bucky’s hand, the one around his waist and pulls it closer, trapping Bucky’s arm against his pecs. His nipples are getting hard. He’s beginning to tingle but it’s everywhere. His cock twitches and now he’s really afraid because he’s done the injection, the dose has been strengthened and if it’s burned off in just a few hours then he doesn’t know how he’ll survive.

It’s that fear, the desperation and horror at his own body’s reactions that makes him keep talking, wanting someone to confide in. “I get hard, like _really_ hard but I have a hard time um….”

“Getting off?” Bucky asks, quietly.

“Yeah. It just gets worse and worse. The drugs prevent that. Uh, And then there was an incident where I went into some kind of shock and it wouldn’t go down until they gave me drugs injected…down there. It was supposed to be a one time thing but it’s gotten to the point now where that happens a lot. The downside is it makes me feel awful. It takes time to recover from that. It’s like I have the flu. But the amount of it I have to take is increasing….”

“Which makes you feel even worse.”

“Right.” Bucky shifts his head closer, nuzzles along the back of Steve’s neck, breathing him in. It’s both calming and arousing.

“Stevie, it doesn’t have to be me. I’m not trying to talk you into anything or whatever, but if you’re submissive then you need a dominant. These are problems that would most likely go away if you were satisfied.”

“Satisfied,” he says, like the word itself is offensive.

“This is a symbiotic relationship. Each side gives and receives. You’re not giving _or _receiving. You’re storing up and getting injections and your body doesn’t know what’s going on. And, there’s also a mental component. You will feel amazing if you submit to a dom you’re compatible with.”

And that just sits there for a moment. Until Steve asks the question he thinks they’re dancing around.

“Why couldn’t it be you?” he asks.

“Because you’ve never wanted me to dominate you in your entire fucking life. The lengths you’d go to, just to make a point—“

“It’s different now.”

“Maybe,” he says, noncommittally.

“I thought they were wrong. From the moment they said I was dominant it felt like a mistake. But they did tests and they’re scientists so I believed them. I had nothing to compare it to. But, I don’t want a submissive, and I can’t go on feeling like this. And the only time I’ve felt good is with you.” He takes Bucky’s hand and brings it to his mouth, kissing him almost reverently.

“Stevie…”

“I’m sorry. I just….”

“Want me to check? Like a test?” Bucky asks finally, ever so quiet.

“How?”

“A grip. On your neck. See how it feels. If you did it to me I wouldn’t like it. A hold like that makes me want to punch someone. But submissives, I can get a lot to go under just from that.”

“What do you mean go under?” Steve’s body tenses. He doesn’t like the sound of that. Those with designations had taken a special health class at school. Steve hadn’t because he hadn’t needed to. He was paying for that lack of knowledge now.

“For a lot of people with designations, the headspace has to be right before the body will do anything. If you’re a submissive then you have to reach a heightened state before your body will start releasing toxins.”

“Orgasm,” Steve says.

“Not necessarily,” Bucky says. “It can come out in urine and sweat too. If you’re in a good place, it doesn’t have to be sexual. And there are a lot of dominants and submissives that will have someone of the opposite designation get them to the right headspace and then leave them to get off on their own or go back to their significant other.”

“And you’re going to go see one of the submissives tomorrow?” Steve asks, because it keeps crowding into his mind. Thinking about Bucky with someone else makes him feel like he’s been mortally wounded.

“We don’t need to be thinking about that right now.” He grips Bucky’s hand tighter, curls up a little tighter into himself.

“Steve. I need you to stay focussed on you right now.” Steve isn’t sure what Bucky is feeling. He’s quiet and his voice is very carefully bland which most likely means he’s pissed off about Steve’s questions regarding seeing a submissive.

“I’m going to grip you now, okay?”

“Okay,” Steve said, and Bucky slides a hand along his neck, brushing gently, almost a tease of his fingers. He spread his hand out, pressed his warm palm against Steve’s neck and Steve fisted a hand in Bucky’s shirt, the anticipation suddenly ratcheting up. He was like a child scared of a shot, not knowing how much it was going to hurt. The fear most likely worse than the reality.

Which would have been kind of funny considering how little pain bothered him. Pain was probably his closest friend and confidant. Except for his necessary injections. Funny. In a non-funny and awful away. His breath is jerky and he’s feeling like he might panic or something. Whatever the something is.

“Shh. You’re alright. Steve, I don’t have to do this.”

“I want you to, I’m just nervous. What if it works? What if it doesn’t?”

“Here’s a thought. Take a deep breath in. Just nice and easy and then hold it until I count to three. Then exhale slow, yeah?”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“I’m waiting,” Bucky said, and Steve took a breath in.

“_Slow_.”

Steve tried to slow down, felt Bucky’s fingers settle in on either side of his neck, along the muscle. He filled his lungs and held it, held it, the fingers easily distinguishable at each point of contact on his skin.

“Good. Exhale,” he said, and his fingers sank in hard and harder and the breath oozed out of him and he went lightheaded, momentarily boneless. A shudder went through him. Light but noticeable. His cock jerked in his pants, the angle now uncomfortable since he was hard. He didn’t think he’d have any problem coming now.

“I felt that, sweetheart. You falling a little?” Bucky asked, voice low and confident. The idea that he knew how to take care of Steve, could read him, help him, exploit him made him push his hips forward, seeking friction.

“Jesus, Bucky. _Bucky_, is this what it’s like?” he rasped and it felt like it came from a long ways away.

“Hmm. You’re still talking pretty clearly so you ain’t that far gone. Do you want more?”

“Umm. Yeah.”

And then Bucky was rolling him over to his stomach and Steve went easily, each breath ragged and fast. Weight settled on him, an arm on his shoulders pressing down, the inside of a thigh slung across his ass, lightly pinning him to the ground.

“How about this, sweetheart?” he asked, and Steve moaned at the endearment.He liked being called that, in that possessive tone. It was good but not enough. “More, please.” He wanted to be covered, overwhelmed, dragged down so far that everything went dark.

“I shouldn’t, Steve. I’m trying very hard not to make this too weird.”

“But I…I need you. It’s a test. You said so.”

Bucky nosed at his neck and Steve grabbed for his hip blindly, trying to pull him closer. On top of him. “I can’t feel you.”

Bucky groaned, softly. “Can’t baby, I’m hard. I’m sorry,” he whispered against Steve’s skin.

“Oh god, Bucky. I don’t fucking care. I need you. I promise we’ll be okay. I _swear_.” 

The tension in Bucky’s body was electric. “Fuck, alright. But promise me you won’t be mad later?”

“I won’t. I swear.”

“I’m a fucking idiot,” Bucky growled, and then he shifted, covering Steve’s back with all of his weight, the drag of Bucky’s hard cock across his ass cheek incinerating. Bucky adjusted his body so his cock was right over the cleft of Steve’s ass and slotted perfectly in between the globes of his ass.

Steve urged his legs apart and Bucky shifted in a little more, a low, dark sound rumbling through his chest. If they were naked Bucky could slide his cock into him, force Steve open, invade his body, making it a home for himself to find pleasure in.

“Oh my god,” he breathed. The idea was terrible and intoxicating.

Bucky slid his hands down Steve’s arms until he reached his hands, gripping his wrists tight, keeping him against the ground. 

He stayed like that for an unknown amount of time, just still and heavy while Steve breathed under him and felt every shift and beat of their bodies. His eyes were closed, his mouth half open and all his muscles, save his cock, were utterly relaxed, exhausted.

The ache in his cock wasn’t steady, it was getting worse, throbbing more, painful as it was pressed against the blanket and the thin padding of their sleeping bags. “Is this okay?” Bucky asked, lips opening against the back of his neck.

“I don’t know. I’m just…I’m so close,” he said, finding it hard to say the words. It just took so much effort.

“Your breathing has slowed. You’re relaxed under me. You’re almost under, sweetheart. Just let go. Give in to it. Give it up to me,” he ordered, and Steve shook and his cock spasmed, spilled a little which somehow made his cock ache even more.

“I want to. I’m trying. I don’t know how,” Steve whispered. There was no relief. Maybe there never would be. A hitched sob came from his throat. What if Steve was just broken and no one could help him?“Just…make me.”

“Shh. Okay,” Bucky whispered, and he let go of Steve’s wrists, slid his fingers between Steve’ and dragged Steve’s arms up so they were above his head.

“Are you good?”

“Good.”

“Are you ready? You’re going to come for me now. Say yes.”

“Yes, yes, yes,” he says, over and over again. Bucky lifts Steve’s hands up, gets his hips and cock off Steve’s ass and slams back down into him.

His hands smack the ground, Bucky’s cock grinds hard into him, as if he was actually going to fuck him. Like he’d just slammed Steve into the wall and was going to take him now.

He’s so sore and aching that the hard pressure of his shaft grinding into the floor, forced down by Bucky’s strength, and body and the press of his cock, is overwhelming. Pain radiates through his body, some combination of lust and hurt and helplessness making it happen, overwhelming him and knocking every hesitation and barrier inside of himself down.

Steve comes hard in his pants, spurting endlessly, the stress and anxiety flooding out of him. “It’s okay, sweetheart. You’ll be okay,” he said, as Steve drifted back to sleep.

***

As Bucky lay on top of an unconscious Steve, his underwear soaked with come after having ( rather unexpectedly) ground out an orgasm on his best friend’s ass, he contemplated his life choices and found them…. lacking.Even, dare he think it, downright shitty.

There was no possible way this was going to end well for him. Steve being sweet and needy, submissive…this was a god damned fucking disaster hurtling towards him. It was a shell shrieking its way closer.

He rested his head on Steve’s neck, breathed him in, kissed his sweat damp neck, and forced himself to move. So much of his life had been devoted to Steve Rogers. To taking care of him, being with him, lusting after him, agonizing over him, fearing for him and wanting him with a passion that bordered on sickness.

His parents thought it was a sickness.

Steve’s mother had thought it was a sickness too. At the end of her life she’d made sure Bucky knew she expected him to watch over Steve. Even though Steve would make it damned difficult.

If there was one thing in the world Steve didn’t want, it was to be coddled, protected and shielded. Treating Steve Rogers like he was weak was the best way to get punched in the face. Steve would be first in line, life on the line, ready to do what was right no matter how impossible the odds.

And now he had the body to back it up. That alone was terrifying. Like giving a race car to a daredevil. What did one expect to happen?

Leave it to the military to not go with a good thing but to want perfection. They couldn’t just have an intelligent, heroic, _good_ man being a super soldier.

The government had wanted a dominant to boot. If Steve said he had dominant markers in his blood then maybe he did but it sure didn’t seem like it.

Bucky knew Steve Rogers better than anyone. Or at least he had. This new, ‘improved’ version of him, complete with designation wasn’t something Bucky could really wrap his brain around.

Steve Rogers being submissive and wanting Bucky to dominate him was a classic spank bank fantasy come true. Maybe, if it was just that, Bucky could wrap his brain around it and trust it, at least a little bit. But it wasn’t just sex. Steve being submissive was a romantic fantasy, a life fantasy, and if he could have one wish in all the world it would be for Steve to be a submissive who wanted Bucky half as much as Bucky wanted him.

Maybe, before he’d shipped out, he’d have believed it was possible that dreams did come true. But now he’d seen war and he’d lost people, hell, he’d almost lost himself and he knew for damned sure what a lie that was.

Dreams did not come true. This weird fluke wasn’t permanent. Them making it through this war, going home together, back to Brooklyn and being in love, getting to grow old together and be designationally compatible lovers? Yeah, fucking right.

The truth was that Bucky shipping out had been a relief for both of them. Well, more a relief for Steve. Bucky was a bit of a martyr and would have stayed and made himself miserable, pretending everything was fine until it broke him, or Steve kicked him out because he couldn’t take Bucky’s overbearing neediness anymore.

If there hadn’t been a war, and he hadn’t been sent to this god forsaken hellscape, he’d likely have spent the rest of his life keeping every submissive relationship he had shallow out of his devotion to Steve. Very likely, he never would have married.

As much as his parents liked Steve, they sure were happy when the two of them were finally separated. They wanted Bucky to be happy. To find a nice, submissive girl and have babies.

It was never going to happen. He realized he was reaching out a hand to touch Steve and he stopped himself.

Steve was dead to the world, just out. Bucky got up and changed clothes, cleaned up the mess on himself as best he could and went to wait in line for a shower.

Steve would have to deal with his own mess when he got up. For a fraction of a moment he imagined urging Steve to his back, unbuttoning his pants and getting him cleaned up, purely for the sake of being kind so he didn’t wake up with dried come stuck to him.

He’d be a god damned humanitarian, really.

He shoved that thought far, far away. And yet…it was there. The idea stayed, tempted him because there was a part of him that wholeheartedly believed Steve was his. And if that was the case then he had the right to his body. To care for him, and use him and help him as he saw fit.

And if that meant opening his pants and jerking Steve off while he was soaked in his own cooling come, so be it. Would Steve hate that or love it? Be revolted and aroused or just one of those submissives that thrived on pleasing their dominant, happy to do anything so long as it made their dom happy?

Wouldn’t Bucky like to know. If Steve was a submissive, it wouldn’t be Bucky taking creepy liberties with Steve’s body it’d be caring for his submissive and Steve would blush and be all sweet and embarrassed about it. Sweet and embarrassed didn’t sound like Steve Rogers.

In fact, the old Steve would have murdered him with a rusty knife for just thinking about it. New Steve would probably still kill him, but could now do it with his bare hands.

Same outcome, different methods.

And maybe it was a _bit_ creepy. A lot creepy. What they’d done was pretty fucking chaste. The idea that Bucky went from hand holding and grinding to ‘let me take advantage of your unconscious body’ said pretty clearly how obsessive and unhealthily fixated on Steve he actually was.

If he wasn’t excruciatingly careful with this, he’d scare Steve off and maybe ruin everything. The thing to do was to keep his distance as much as he could and try not to make it weird.

He’d help Steve if he asked or looked like he was really struggling but he wouldn’t push. This wasn’t about Bucky or what he wanted. It wasn’t about claiming Steve, wish fulfillment and eventual soul-destroying heartbreak when Steve got himself sorted out.

Steve was going through some stuff which may or may not be permanent and Bucky would help him as coolly and clinically as possible so that when this was all over he’d hopefully still have a friend.

The reality was that there was what he wanted to do to Steve and then there was what was responsible. The two were very different. And it wasn’t impossible to reconcile the two it would just be difficult and sexually frustrating.

Basically, the same as usual.

If Steve needed more from him, they’d find a way. Bucky would think about what he wanted and work backwards to find the least exploitive way to go about it.

He could do that. Bucky could make sure they kept clothes on. He could make sure Steve touched himself whenever possible. And Bucky could keep his dick in his pants. No, Bucky _would_ keep his dick in his pants….And he’d also jerk off so he could control his urges and stick to these very sensible guidelines. Like, five times a day if necessary.

Assuming Steve wanted to carry on exploring his designation, Bucky was prepared. This was totally possible. It’d be fine.

***

God damned Peggy Carter was waiting for him when he came out of the showers. “Sergeant Barnes, we need a few men for a quick mission. Nothing too challenging. Is that something you’d be up for?”

Could he tell her to go fuck herself? She must know he’d just been tortured. Did she want to get him killed, get him away from Steve so she could have him all to herself? Weren’t there a hundred other guys who could go?

“Anything you need, Agent Carter,” he said, putting on a false smile. Maybe he’d go out there, get blown up and his Steve related existential crisis would be neatly resolved.

He went back to the tent and got ready for the mission. Steve was still asleep. Poor bastard apparently needed the rest. Bucky thought about waking Steve up to say goodbye but that might be even weirder.

Bucky really didn’t think he wanted to be there when the fog of lust was gone and Steve realized what they’d done. And he could imagine the look of disgust on his face as he had to contend with the mess in his pants. The odds of Bucky getting a shit ton of blame for what had happened were 50/50.

He left a note. “Everything is fine. Sent on a mission. Back soon.”Maybe he should have said other things. Supportive, declarative, complicated things, but he couldn’t handle any of that right now and fuck only knew what the right thing to say was anyway.

Bucky picked up his gun and left the tent.Touching it made his skin crawl. God, he didn’t want to fucking fight.

Peggy gave him the orders. There was an abandoned German artillery gun a few miles away and apparently it needed to be destroyed ASAP.

It should have been easy. And, most of it was easy. They got to the gun and there wasn’t a sign of anybody nearby. Bucky covered Smith while he got the explosion set up and then waited for him to come back so they could detonate it. The third guy he was with was new and jumpy but Bucky suspected he was submissive because he calmed down pretty quick when Bucky got close to him and started giving him directions.

Smith didn’t come back to set off the bomb and he finally had to send Larson after him to see what the fuck was going on. He was twenty-one, fresh faced and straight out of Iowa. A nice kid. Smith was a bit of an asshole but who wasn’t? 

Bucky still doesn’t know what happened. Less than a minute later there was an explosion. He didn’t have to get too close to realize they’d both been caught up in it. There were…pieces. And so he’d left. Hadn’t even tried to find their dog tags. Just….left.

He didn’t know if he could have found the tags. Where would he have searched? How? Bucky walked back, dazed and out of it. So out of it that he ran into members of his own company, almost getting shot when he didn’t give the proper signal as he stumbled back to base.

Fortunately, he’d been recognized in the light of a bright moon and they’d taken him aside, debriefed him and put him in the back of a truck to send him the rest of the way back to his camp.

And that was good because one of the guys offered him booze and someone else had a cigarette and they’d been over there long enough to know that Bucky was fucked up enough that he needed to be left alone.


	6. Chapter 6

“What the fuck do you mean, he’s out on a _mission_?” Steve growled, looming over Peggy while she sat behind the desk doing paperwork.

She leaned back in her chair, unimpressed by his anger. “What part wasn’t clear? Sergeant Barnes is doing his job.”

“He’s just been fucking tortured!”

Peggy stands up, leans closer, letting Steve see that she’s pissed off too. “Then _perhaps_ he should take the discharge that’s been offered to him and go _home_.”

It’s as though she’s slapped him. He’s speechless.

“Which one is it, Steve? Is he fine, and able to stay here and work with you like you’ve requested, or does he need to be coddled because he’s seen and endured horrible things? You don’t get to have it both ways.”

“You could have sent anyone else. Hell, you could have sent me.”

“I needed a sniper. Do you do that? There are five snipers here. Three of them just got back from a mission and haven’t slept in three days.”

“What about the other one? You had a choice.”

She straightens up. “As a matter of fact, I did. But, I asked James if he wanted to go and he said yes. This mission is a cakewalk. If he struggles with it then perhaps you should reconsider having him on your team.”

“You think I should send him home,” he says, devastated. It isn’t even a question, he knows what the right thing to do is.

For the first time, he can see cracks in her armor, that she isn’t trying to be cruel. “He cares for you a great deal. Soldiers do not like to abandon their comrades. It’s up to you to be objective and decide if he can be here or not. I understand you want to go into the field with him and be a hero. Have your best friend by your side. But, if he gets out there and he can’t handle it… we can’t risk you too. He needs to prove he can take care of himself.”

So this was a test of sorts. And if Bucky came back all swagger and strength then Steve could keep him. A cakewalk.So he should be fine. It’s suddenly hitting him how strong Bucky is. How many times had Steve rejected him and Bucky had shrugged it off, put aside his ego and hurt and tried to be there for Steve?

Now it was Steve’s turn to do what was best for Bucky, and he had no idea if he could do it.

He’d left her office, blinking in the gloomy rain and wondered if he was as horrible a person as she seemed to be implying. Did Bucky need to go home?

Steve went back to his tent, cleaned, straightened, and finished paperwork. He went to some stupid meetings and even tagged along on a trip over to HQ and the field hospital to show his face like they always wanted him to do. And then he went back to his tent, again, and Bucky still wasn’t there.

It hadn’t been that long. There were still several hours before he’d be considered late back. Just because he wasn’t back yet didn’t mean anything bad had happened to him.

Which gave Steve even more time to think.

And he didn’t need or want time to think. He’d gotten up this morning and been alone. He’d felt better than he had in weeks. He’d gone to take a shower and he’d jerked off and come, and sure, it had taken a while but he’d known it was going to be okay and had gotten through it. If there were other things there that had been disappointing (like waking up alone, not even getting a kiss, etc.) he pushed those aside as irrelevant.

He just wanted to see Bucky and make sure they were okay.Steve shivered at the possibilities, closed his eyes and tried not to imagine all the things he wanted to do with him. Because thinking about it made him hard and left him wanting. But there wasn’t anything else to do and his mind refused to linger on the endless things that might go wrong, which meant that after an hour had gone by, he’d finally had to give up, unbutton his pants and touch himself, stroking and rubbing his cock until he was panting and beginning to ache.

He let his cock go, risked a glance down to see the ridiculous organ and felt panic start to twist through him. When he’d first begun to play with himself, gentle and with no real intent, fluid had come out of the tip, so much so that he’d even got to wipe a bit up as it slid down the shaft. It had made him overconfident.

Now he was here and he was aching and there wasn’t a sign of anything being released. The feelings of pleasure and aching had been diffused and he hadn’t been concentrating on it too much, was just trying to enjoy it and stay above it all, but now he was thinking about it, analyzing the quality of each touch and the heavy discomfort was in his cock, but it was lower too. It was his balls and that area behind it. Hot to the touch and swollen. So swollen he didn’t usually touch himself there. Nothing more than the gentlest touch for weeks, and if possible, avoiding it all together.

Trying to pretend the problem didn’t exist.

He got to his feet and forced himself to put his underwear back over his shaft and button his pants. He wasn’t going to come. He was right back where he’d been yesterday and all the days before Bucky. Hell, maybe even worse, because he’d spent all that time getting worked up and believing like an idiot that he could come like a normal person.

Steve looked around the room. There wasn’t a damned thing to punch.

***

When Bucky finally made it back to camp, he came into the tent smelling of alcohol and cigarette smoke. “I made sure to save you a plate from dinner,” he said, gesturing to the desk. It was the good stuff too, leftover from the meeting he’d been in with the important people who got good food, instead of the stuff they were trying to call spaghetti and serving in the mess hall.

“That’s thoughtful.” He listed to the side a little, stared at Steve’s lips for a moment and then made his way to a crate they were using as a chair.

“How are you, Buck?” he asked, even though things had clearly not gone well.

“Fucking tired.”

“How did the mission go?”

“For me? Fantastic. Here I am. For the guys I was with…it was fast.”

Was he serious? What the hell had happened?

Bucky put his head down into his hands and breathed for a moment. “It was an unbelievably awful fucking day. And, I’ve had awful days. I wonder if she did it on purpose,” he murmurs, almost absently, looking around the room like the answer is written on the wall..

“You’re going to be okay, Buck,” Steve said, not quite sure what to do next. He continued to stand there feeling uncertain and inadequate.

A bitter laugh. “That sounds _very _fucking unlikely.” He rubbed a hand on his thigh and looked down at it like it was personally offensive. He held it in front of him, both of them realizing it was trembling. “I hear the submissives left,” Bucky says, like it’s a random comment and not going to make Steve crazy.

Bucky looks up at him. Blinking. “You are pretty as a fucking picture.”

“Always good to be second choice.”

Bucky laughs. “Yeah, Steve. Isn’t that it exactly?” He says, sounding miserable and a little resentful.

“I should go. Let you do…whatever.”

“No. You should stay,” Bucky says, and he rolls his bottom lip into his mouth, giving Steve a look he’d definitely call leering.

“What do you want?” he asks, and his cock is getting hard. Which is….He’d taken a shot this afternoon. This isn’t right. Maybe, the drugs aren’t even working at all now. That will cause panic fairly soon. Maybe in the depths of the night when he’s feeling particularly alone and useless.

“I want you to come over here and take care of me,” Bucky says. Bucky bends over to try to unlace his boot and almost falls off the crate. “If I die in the night, you tell Dum Dum it was from that crap he called alcohol.”

Steve went over, put a hand on his shoulder to keep him upright and went down to his knees, untied Bucky’s boot and pulled it off, tossing it to the side. He took off the other one too and then stayed there for a long moment, a rabbit trapped by a fox. He felt small like this, vulnerable, could feel the dominance radiating off of Bucky above him. “Not just pretty. God, you look at me like I can have you. Do you know you do that now?”

Steve is begging hi with his gaze to take him.

“How about my shirt, sweetheart?” Bucky said and Steve moved forward, between his spread legs, ignoring the visible sight of his aroused cock and reached up for his shirt buttons. He undid them clumsily. A blush staining his cheeks. “You been waiting for me? All cleaned up and pretty. It’s a nice thing to come home to. Gives a man ideas, though,” he says, reaching a hand behind Steve and sliding it down to Steve’s ass, gripping him hard and then letting go.

It takes him a moment to get words out. The touch is still there, like heat seeping through his clothing and into him. He’d probably kill someone to have that touch again if that’s what it took. “What,” he swallowed, “What kind of ideas?”

Bucky put a finger under Steve’s chin, tilted his head up and looked into Steve’s eyes. “You’re very beautiful, Stevie. If I were drunk I think I’d tell you something ridiculous about how good you look on your knees.” He shakes his head, burps quietly. “Stupid thing to say. And, possibly, I’m very, very drunk,” he says, with all the profound wisdom of an inebriated man.

“It’s alright,” Steve says. Maybe Bucky will be rougher with him, more careless and demanding. It takes everything in him to not grab his cock at the thought.

“Stevie,” he says, again, almost agonized, and he puts a hand on the side of Steve’s face, cupping it and looking down into his eyes. His thumb brushes Steve’s lip and Steve can’t help it, his tongue darting out and tasting Bucky’s skin. “Stupid but true. Is there any chance you missed me while I was gone? Did you wake up and wish I was here?” Bucky was staring at him, he could feel his attention, hot and loose with alcohol.

He didn’t want to agree or disagree. Couldn’t. He needed Bucky so he didn’t want to be honest, but this was Bucky, and he couldn’t lie to him.Because, now he was thinking of what Peggy had said and he could see the truth of it all. He _should_ make Bucky go home. Bucky shouldn’t stay here with him. He’d been through enough.

And Steve, he wasn’t sure he could make it without Bucky by his side. He blinked and a tear slipped down his cheek. Bucky wiped it up with a finger, put it in his mouth and sucked the tear off. He brought that finger to Steve’s lips, damp and Steve let his lips part, relaxed his jaw and sucked Bucky’s finger into his mouth.

“That’s a pretty good answer. Could have done without the tears, though.”

“Don’t be a jerk.” Steve says, his voice feeling lost and too quiet. “Yeah, I woke up and wished you were here.” He clears his throat, hopes that might help him sound more together and somehow be more together too.

“Thought about you. You look, sweetheart, you look like you’ve been missing me, too. I really hope I remember this in the morning. You look so fucking beautiful on your knees in front of me I can’t hardly stand it.”

Steve licked his lips. He needed Bucky to kiss him. Steve was just about to push up and do it himself when Bucky spoke.

“We’re in luck. I have a plan so we don’t get all fucked up.” Bucky whispered, and he put his hands on Steve, on his shoulders and down his arms, gentle and then harder. He let go of Steve and placed his hands on Steve’s collarbones, slid them down and rested his hands over Steve’s pecs, pressing gently. “You gonna complain, sweetheart?”

“No.” Bucky looks at his face, reading him like this is a life or death game of poker. He adjust his hands, cupped Steve’s chest like he was a girl, liting his pecs to feel the weight and shape of them. His grip tightened and Steve shook in pleasure.

Bucky’s hands stayed there for a moment and Steve wished he’d touch his nipples, would pinch them, even put his mouth on them. “Take this off,” Bucky growls.

“You have to let me go then,” he eventually says, because Bucky’s grip has grown tighter and now he _is _brushing his thumbs over Steve’s nipples. He’d take it off but Bucky has to let him go first. It’s so good he’ll just stay here if Bucky doesn’t stop. God, he might come from this. He grabs Bucky’s wrists desperately, wanting more, needing everything from him. “Harder.”

Bucky shakes his head and his hands loosen. He might have bruises, fingerprint shaped bruises on the edges and that would be amazing. But, he’s not sure it would last long enough for him to see it.

“Let me take it off,” Steve says, trying to do what Bucky told him to while Bucky pets his chest contemplatively. 

Bucky flinches back from him when Steve’s words finally register. “What? _No_. Fuck. Forget I said that. Sorry.” Bucky blinked and shook his head. “Right. How about this. Can you stay there for a while? Nothing else, just…where you are?” he asked, eyes hot.

With a look like that? Yeah, he can do that. He thinks Bucky might lunge at him, knock him over and just take from him he’s shaking so badly. “Yeah, Buck. Come on.”

“It’s fine. It’s just you. Just… just on your _knees_, right fucking _here_,” he growls, like everything I’ve ever wanted. And that can’t be right, can it? We don’t get what we want do we babydoll?” Bucky slides a hand into Steve’s hair, grabbing him tight and tilting his head back until Steve gasped.

Bucky leaned in closer, over him, speaking so close that his lips close on Steve’s bottom lip and slide away with each word. “I want to eat every fucking breath and sound that comes out of your body. It is _all_ _mine_.”

They’re like kisses but not and he’d do anything to have them. Anything at all. “Please, Bucky.”

He’s got a hand down between his legs and he’s trying to open his pants, he needs to touch himself so badly. He’s fumbling and Bucky is holding his gaze and then staring at his wet, open mouth.

“When I do this, hand in your hair and pull you back, I want you to open your mouth, just like you’re doing, so you can suck my—“ Bucky stops himself from speaking and lets Steve go.

“Yes. What?” he asks, feeling drugged. He’s swaying a little so he goes back down, resting on his heels. He lifts his hands to Bucky’s pants, reaching for the zipper to take him out and suck his cock. Because he’d worked it out, after all. He’s just so hard and desperate that everything seems to be taking a bit longer to filter into his brain.

“Nothing. Put your hands down. There is a rule about pants. I have a rule, you have a rule. _Rules_. I hate rules,” he murmurs, and adjusts his cock in his pants. “Do you ever _hate_ rules?”

“Yeah, Buck. In general, I hate rules.”

Bucky laughs. “Yes, you do. I love you for that. It’s also terrifying. Have I mentioned how good you look down there? How are you? Do you want to punch me?” He sounds a little more coherent with each work. The bastard. Steve’s feeling wrecked and on edge and Bucky seems to be sobering up.

“No, Buck. I don’t want to punch you. I might die of sexual frustration though, if you don’t get on with it.” 

“Good. The not punching part. The frustration is just….Um, put your head on my thigh and your arms around my waist and just stay there. Will you do that? That’s fine, isn’t it?”

Steve swallowed hard. “Yes, Bucky, that’s fine,” he managed, and he wrapped his arms around him, putting his head on Bucky’s thigh and trembled while he waited for whatever came next.

Bucky ran a hand through his hair for a long while, until they both stopped trembling. He smelled like travel and metal and booze and he knew that if Bucky were a little more stable or sober he never would have come into the tent like this, he would have washed up and made himself presentable.

In some indefinable way it made it better. Like he was able to support Bucky too. Give him something he needed. When he was struggling Steve could help him. Like maybe he’d needed Steve so badly that he’d had to come here first. The stress of being here might kill him. He’s ready to get on with it now. Get a cock in his mouth and Bucky’s hand on him. God, what if Bucky put his mouth on Steve?

A hand stroked through his hair gently, the other on his neck, just touching Steve until he finally let out a shuddering breath and some of the tension relaxed. All the anticipation and desperation slipped downwards, coalescing in that familiar pulse and endless need between his legs.

Bucky swept his fingers over Steve’s neck and then gripped him again and Steve started to drift, the busy sounds of the camp fading to a murmur, his legs going numb and then fading to nothing and in a way it almost felt like he himself was fading away too, becoming part of Bucky, subsumed by him, his autonomy and will ever so slowly evaporating.

Bucky finally shifted at some point, calling Steve’s name a little louder and Steve blinked back to himself, a flush climbing up his neck as he looked at Bucky. Bucky who was smiling at him gently. “Thank you, baby.”

“Anytime, Buck.”

Bucky helped him to his feet and Steve groaned at the pins and needles feeling of blood returning to his legs. Steve’s cock was hard and his underwear was damp. He had a vague sense that his cock had been dripping, that he’d felt it happening when he drifted and let Bucky support him.

He didn’t understand the mechanics of this whole designation nonsense. He hadn’t even been touching himself and his pants felt soaked, like he’d come in them. And yet, if he’d gotten a hand on himself, there might be half as much. It would all be a lot more terrifying if Bucky wasn’t here, keeping him steady with his touch.

Bucky crowded close and kissed him on the mouth, tongue swiping over his bottom lip and gently nipping him and pulling back before Steve could follow along and kiss back. He pressed his forehead hard into Steve’s. “Sorry. Are you okay?”

“Yeah, Buck. I’m okay.” He hated this. Hated how very careful Bucky was being with him. Even when he was drunk and compromised he was thinking about Steve. He’d never take care of himself first.

If Steve was a submissive, wasn’t he supposed to submit? Shouldn’t Bucky want him to? Was Steve really so inadequate? “I didn’t even do anything,” he said, a little desperate. “I could do more. I thought you wanted me to suck…put my mouth on you.”

Bucky’s cheeks went pink and he could hardly look Steve in the eyes. “I’m sorry I said it, and you did real good, Stevie. It wasn’t nothing. You endured that for me and let me see it. I’m gonna go take a shower and then I’m gonna sleep for a damned week. Or until breakfast,” he muttered, and he turned to go.

Wait. Wait just a fucking minute. Was Bucky going to walk away from him now? “Are you fucking kidding me? You’d have let one of them do it, right? A woman you don’t even _know_ would get more from you then I do? That’s some serious devotion you’ve got for me, Buck.”

“I love you, Steve.” He didn’t sound very happy about it. Bucky left the tent.

***

Steve was both furious and sad. He wasn’t sure which one he felt more keenly or which one was worse. He was also so sexually frustrated he wanted to weep with it.

Even though he was furious he kept thinking about Bucky and the mission he’d had. Bucky’d had an awful day, potentially made worse by a woman who wanted Steve.

Feeling guilty and off, he didn’t leave but hung around, got their bedrolls sorted, finished his paperwork, put Bucky’s shoes away and waited for Bucky to come back.

Bucky finally came back in, hair washed, smelling of soap, cheeks flushed. He’d come again. Of course he had. Without him no less. Fury rose within him and it was stupid because Steve had no right to be jealous of Bucky’s right hand. But he was. The line between what he wanted and needed was blurring. He wanted to take care of Bucky any way he could.

More selfishly, he felt betrayed by Bucky and his own body. It was like Bucky was flaunting how easily he could get off. Steve got him worked up? He took care of it. What was Steve going to do? Bucky knew how hard this was for him. Bucky had said he’d help him.What was this bullshit?

Bucky laid down, seemingly a lot more sober and steady now. His eyes closed like he was going to sleep. “You gonna turn out the light?” Bucky asked.

“I’m doing work,” he said petulantly, and made a point of rustling his papers noisily. He hadn’t decided yet on what he was going to say.

“Oh, sweetheart. If I didn’t know better I’d say you were being a brat.”

“Maybe you should take your bedroll outside then, where the light won’t bother you,” he said, licking his lips. His cock was full to bursting and he dropped a hand down to touch himself since Bucky’s eyes were closed.

Bucky sighed. “Or, maybe you should turn the light off and come to bed now.”

His stomach flipped and he couldn’t decide if it felt good or bad. Like arousal or disappointment. “I don’t know what you want from me.”

“Yes, you do. You just didn’t hear it like you wanted to. You’re invited to sleep here, now, with me.”

And that was it! Literal sleep. Bucky’s breathing evened out, he put his hands behind his head, peaceful as can be. What did that even mean, Steve didn’t hear what he wanted to? Who did Bucky think he was? He’d gotten his and so now he was going to sleep? He rubbed absently at his knee, imagining he could still feel an echo of the numbness from being on the floor.

And he got no gratitude for it. Steve stood up, annoyed, his chair almost falling over. He picked up his papers, grabbed a pen, figured he’d go somewhere else, let annoyance fill him.

“I can hear you getting all riled up from here.”

“What makes you think you can be so dismissive of me? Is this what happens to submissives and why you never dated the same girl twice? You feel so superior you get to discard them and order them around when you don’t have…_use_ for them,” he said, getting tangled up on that word.

It was such a stupid word for Steve to come back to and fantasize about. Use. To attach desire and lust and even comfort to. Wasn’t it dehumanizing? Wasn’t it actually a perfect encapsulation of everything that was wrong with being a submissive? And yet, he could barely even say the word without feeling like he was giving himself away or making himself vulnerable. God, he hated this.

“You wouldn’t like me as I am right now. I don’t have the patience to hold your hand through all of this tonight. I’m a mess, you’re a mess, just drop it.”

“That is so fucking patronizing.”

“Is it?” Bucky demands, slamming his hand down on the ground beside him. “You realize I didn’t even hold your hand yesterday? I had to keep my _eyes closed_ while you touched yourself. It’s fucking complicated and I love you enough to do complicated, I do. But not _tonight_.” He shoves his hands over his eyes. “Fuck. Just… I swear to God I’m trying to do right by you. I am. But, you’ve gotta fucking help me a little. I’m _begging_ you.” He sounded tortured.

Now there was a series of sentences it turned out Steve never wanted to hear. His throat actually clogged up with emotion and it took him two tries before being able to speak.

“After all this time, the one thing I didn’t expect was that you wouldn’t want to touch me. That was actually a given. I mean, what was the point of it all back home? All the touching and having to leave and jerking off to not offend me and now I’m here, and I want it, I need it and you won’t even…._oh_,” he says, hopeless and dull as realization dawns. 

Bucky huffs. “Stevie. Whatever bullshit you’ve just come up with, whatever that ‘oh’ was, it’s _wrong_.”

“If you don’t know what it is, then you don’t know it’s wrong,” he says, absolutely refusing to believe that Bucky might know him that well. 

“Tell me what it is then. Tell me what genius conclusion you just came to about why I’m trying to do right by you?”

“You liked me better smaller.”

Bucky chuckles, miserably. “Good point. _Exactly_. I liked knowing you were a cool breeze away from death every moment of the god damned day.”

“That’s my health not my body,” he says, sounding a little prim.

“Oh, my god.”

“Don’t say it like I’m a burden to you.”

“Then I said it wrong. You’re not a burden, Stevie, you’re a fucking idiot. How can someone so smart be so stupid? I want you. I want to do despicable, _depraved_ things to you. I want to come in you and on you and make you fucking cry with how much I need you. Jesus Christ, I would—“ He stops himself with a gasp. His hand going down to his cock, adjusting himself and giving a rough squeeze. He lets himself go, looks at his hand again. Trembling. Good, Steve thinks. Misery loves company and Bucky deserved it. “Fuck.” His voice is rough. “But, there is one thing I want more than all of that. And, it’s to have you, _any_ part of you, when this designational bullshit gets resolved. If I’m careful and we do this right…maybe I’ll still have a friend when it’s over.” 

“Why are you worried about that when I can barely get through today? What later do you think there is going to be for me?” Steve demands, and then gives up, totally defeated.

There’s a moment of silence. “What are you talking about?”

“You know what I’m talking about. Just because you can get off easily and have fucking options like random submissives and your god damned hand, doesn’t mean you can treat me like crap. So, fuck you. I’ll work it out on my own…or die or something,” he says, seething inside.

“Stevie,” he says, pushing up so he’s sitting.

“I mean, what a dick. What a fucking asshole you’re being to me. You get me hard, you even make me trust you and now you’re telling me I’m being a brat and should go to sleep? I already gave myself a fucking injection today. I’ve taken half my fucking pills and I’ve been out of my mind worried for you and….” He pauses, takes a breath. “Is this pay back or something?” he asks.

Bucky gets to his feet, comes closer. “No. It isn’t payback. I’m not trying to be cruel to you,” he says, and he looks worried now. He’s coming closer to Steve like Steve is a wild animal.

“You keep saying that. And yet, you are.” Doesn’t he see how awful he’s being?

Bucky takes a step closer and Steve holds out a hand to keep him away, moving back, head turned away from him, as he can’t even bear to look at him let alone touch him. “Please, don’t. I can’t have you touch me right now and then not follow through again. I genuinely don’t know what I’ll do.”

“Okay,” he says. “I’m— Stevie. I’m sorry.” he says, softly, leaning towards the side to try and catch Steve’s eye. “Part of me just didn’t believe it, even after you told me, I’ve been so afraid that I’ve completely failed you. Failed to pay attention to what you were saying. I’m sorry.” Bucky touches his hand, kisses his palm and lowers it to his side. Bucky is literally lowering Steve’s defenses, his paltry attempt to protect himself.

He closes his eyes and waits, feeling like he’s going to break, not trusting that he’ll get what he needs. “I’m sorry,” Bucky says, again, closer and closer until he’s so close their chests touch. “I get it. I’ll take care of you, sweetheart,” he says. Bucky puts his hands on Steve’s face and then he’s kissing Steve.

Kissing his lips with gentle kisses over and over again, dozens of them, until Steve isn’t doing anything but waiting and murmuring gratefully with each one, on edge to take whatever Bucky will give him.

Bucky makes a sound in his throat, low and soft and tilts his head slightly, lips touching his for a little longer, a little harder, wetter as he lets his tongue brush the bottom of Steve’s lips.It’s so good Steve might cry.

“I don’t know what to do,” he says, terrified he’s going to fuck it up or not be good enough. Terrified some new reason will come up and he won’t get what he needs.

“I do. Come here, sweetheart,” he said, and he moved to the chair, got it turned so there was room. He sat down and waited for Steve to come closer.

“Where?”

“Just get down on your knees again for me. Put your head on my thigh like you did before. You liked that, didn’t you, Steve?”

All he can do is nod. He loved it. It’s the best he’s felt since he got the serum if he’s being honest. He goes closer and Bucky spreads his legs.

Oh fuck. Steve looks at his pants, is trying to find the shape of his dick, wanting to know how Bucky feels about this, but he can’t tell. Steve’s own dick is pounding in time with his heartbeat he’s so turned on. He drops down to the ground, arms brushing Bucky’s knees he’s so close to him.

Bucky puts a finger under his chin, forces him to make eye contact. “You’re going to need to answer me when I ask you questions. I have to know you’re okay with what we do. Sometimes it might be difficult to speak. You’ve gotta try, okay?”

“Yeah, Buck. I can do that.”

“Course you can,” he says, like he’s proud of him. A weird rush of feeling, effervescent and intense goes through him. Steve tries to shake it off. “What happened?” Bucky asks him, putting his hand on the back of Steve’s neck, squeezing gently.

“Nothing. Just felt strange after you said that.”

Bucky gets a crooked smile on his face. “Strange or good?”

Steve blushes. “Screw you. Good.” Bucky leans in, presses a kiss to his forehead and Steve sways into him.

“See? That’s just the start. I say the right thing, you respond and it makes me want you more and we go around and around. It’s easy if we let it be easy.”

Is that true? Is _that_ what they mean by the give and take of it? One of them gives first and then they each do? Steve had thought of it as a competition, or something unequal. He’d be on his knees like a slave or a servant, giving and Bucky would be taking and he’d be losing pieces of himself every time. But, maybe it isn’t that. Steve can check.

He looks at Bucky’s lips. Licks his own, lets Bucky see how much he wants him right now. “I want it to be easy. Just this and…you. Need you so much.”

“Sweetheart,” Bucky murmurs, like Steve has given him a gift. He’s suddenly all over Steve, kissing his forehead again, running his hands up and down his arms and along his back. He drags his fingers along Steve’s neck and squeezes and Steve has to drop a hand down to his cock.

“Fuck,” he grunts, as his cock spasms. It hurts and he flinches, thinks about getting away because this is really working him up and if he doesn’t get relief he’ll be back in medical with a hard on that won’t go away.

Panic is rising inside him as his mind and body register just how painful everything below the waist is. Nothing good will come of this desire, that’s the lesson he’s already learned.

He hates this. He can’t do it.

“Where are you? What’s happening?”

“Hurts.”

“I was going to have you touch yourself, guide you through it, but that isn’t going to work, is it baby?”

Steve shakes his head dully. “I hate all of this. My body, this thing, these feelings.” He doesn’t want to be responsible for this anymore. He always fails. He just needs to know it’s going to work. “You touch me.” 

“Shh, it’s okay. We’ll do that instead. Can I open your pants? Get your cock out?”

He presses his forehead to Bucky’s chin and drags air into his lungs as Bucky unbuttons Steve’s pants, pulls down the zipper and gently shifts the fabric out of the way. Even that is too much and he bites his lip, swallows down noises. Bucky is hushing him some more, kissing his lips softly, so gentle and his hands go to Steve’s hips and behind him, scraping his short nails down Steve’s clothed ass. He shivers in response.

“You’re going to be okay. I promise. I _swear_,” Bucky says, and his hands slip into Steve’s pants, push his trousers down to his thighs. His hands come back to the front and he slips his thumbs into the waistband of Steve’s underpants, pulling it open and carefully off of him so no part of the fabric touches his engorged shaft.

“Gently, gently, gently.” Steve chants, shaking in fear. He swallows. Fuck, is he the one who keeps saying that aloud? He’s praying and begging and trying to ground himself in the moment so he doesn’t run away screaming.

Bucky gets it. He’s so careful, acting like Steve is a fucking land mine about to go off.

“Poor sweetheart. Of course you hurt. Just let me. I won’t let you down, Stevie. After all this time of wanting you, you think I’d fuck this up?”

Those words make it through to him and he kisses Bucky with an open mouth. He tastes so good. Bucky pushes the chair back and gets down on the ground with Steve so he has better access to him.

Fingers slide behind Steve’s thighs, to the crease behind his balls, their bodies so very close together. The moment his fingers slip to his perineum, Bucky goes still. He presses gently and Steve whimpers.

“Baby.” There’s so much agony in the one word. “I didn’t know it was this bad. I’m sorry. You know this isn’t normal, right?” He buries his face in Bucky’s neck, soaking him with tears. “But, we’ll get you all fixed up, babydoll. You’ll be fine. You’re all swollen here. This has to be cleared out. Feel how hard it is? This part of you should be soft and feel good. I should be able to rut against you here. But, it’s like knots under your skin. You’ve been like this for a while, haven’t you? I’m sorry you’re in so much pain, sweetheart, sorry I let you down,” he murmurs.

“I don’t know how bad it is. I’ve been trying not to think about it.” Bucky takes his hand and guides him to the area.

“Softly. Be gentle, baby,” which should be funny, as of course Steve will be gentle to himself. But it also makes him feel good, feel like Bucky is watching out for him, protecting him from everyone and everything. Including himself.

Bucky is guiding his hand like Steve is a visitor to his own body. He feels the swelling Bucky is mentioning, feels the slightly raised areas that are hotter than the others. It’s embarrassing that he didn’t know how bad it had gotten. But, he’d just stopped paying attention, had been trying to ignore the whole thing as much as possible. It’s scary and he feels betrayed by this new body. He’d known all of his defects before, gotten used to them, he couldn’t deal with these new ones.

“I’ll take care of you. I’ll make you feel good, I promise.”

“I don’t want to take care of myself. I want it to go away. I hate it.”

“Then you leave it to me. Hmm?” Bucky kisses him, sealing the promises with his mouth.

“What about you?” Steve asks. 

“I’ll feel good too, sweetheart.”

Steve’s balls contract and he groans in pain as comes slides out of his slit and slips down his shaft.

“Are you okay?

“Yes and no.” 

“Keep kissing me. I’m going to makeyou come now, Stevie.”

He stills. Meets Bucky’s gaze. “I’m scared. What if it doesn’t work?”

“Oh, ye of little faith,” he says, with that same cocky attitude that had led him to sleep with half the submissives in Brooklyn. He stands up and helps Steve to his feet, strips him where he stands and leads him to the bedrolls. Steve goes down to his back while Bucky digs around in his bag.

“What is that?” he asks, as Bucky sets a tin down next to them.

“My submissive kit.”

“You have a _kit_?”

Bucky gets back down on the ground next to him. “Of course, I do.”

“What’s um…in it?” and what does he mean ‘of course?’ No way is that a normal thing.

Bucky opens it up. There’s condoms and vaseline, a few dildos, some rings and a few vials of oil.

“Is this normal? Does this make you some kind of sex freak?”

“No, Stevie, it doesn’t. Maybe normal people don’t have a kit, but people with designations do. He takes out a small bottle and sets it down next to the pillow.

“What is that?” he asks.

“We’re gonna get you sorted out, sweetheart,” he says. He gets Steve’s towel and puts it under him. Bucky takes off his shirt but keeps his pants on.

“What about you?”

“We don’t need me getting distracted right now. We’ll get you in a better way and then see where we are.”

“But, I want—“

“No Steve. This isn’t about what you want. Not right now. It’s about what I need to give you. Now lay down, I want to touch you and make you drip everywhere.”

“I don’t…I don’t do that.” And that’s a token protest. No, he doesn’t drip everywhere, but it sure would feel good, so what the hell. He can have a freak out later if he needs to.

His smile is so smug Steve obeys. Bucky kisses him, hand wandering all over Steve’s chest, cupping his breast and toying with his nipples. He goes back and forth, kissing his mouth and his neck and he plays with Steve’s chest until Steve is embarrassed about it. The area tingles, feels a little warm and swollen. “Feel how hard you are here? This is too hard, too.”

“How do you know? It’s probably supposed to be harder for a man.”

“Steve. Europe accepts submissive men a lot more than they do in America. America likes to pretend they don’t even exist, like they could change if they tried harder. It’s evil.”

That is what he’d thought. That they didn’t really exist or they could control it if they tried. “So you’ve been with men…of my designation?”

“Some,” he says, cagily. “Enough to know this isn’t right.”

“I may not be like them.”

“You’re not. There ain’t no one like you, Steve. Believe me on that one. But, for as perfect as you are here,” he says, tracing a finger around Steve’s nipple and then bending down to kiss each one, “they should be softer.”

“Maybe it’s becuase I’m not really a submissive.”

Bucky takes Steve’s hand and makes him press in under his nipple where there’s a series of lumps he never noticed. “Those go down. That’s inflammation because you’re so backed up. Hormones out of whack.” Bucky licks his lips and a flush rises up his neck. “Only submissives have this. I’m sorry I didn’t get it before, Steve.”

So, Bucky believes him now. Steve is a submissive. This isconfirmation. Fuck. Steve digs in his fingers, angry at his body’s further betrayal and the pain of it is blinding. Bucky stops him. “Gentle. We’ll get to it. Slow and easy, babydoll.”

Steve blushes. Please don’t call me babydoll. It’s on the tip of his tongue but he can’t quite say it.

“Open your legs, Stevie,” and Bucky’s fingers glide down to his perineum, his touch gentle.

“Hurts, Buck.”

Bucky pulls back and gets the bottle, pours liquid into his hand and kisses Steve, distracting him before he puts his hand back between Steve’s legs. It’s warmer than Bucky’s hand and Steve huffs in a breath uncertainly.

“It’ll numb you a little. It’s usually for anal sex, that first bit can sting and this makes it better, but this will help you too.”

_Anal sex?_ Bucky has had _anal sex_?!?! Bucky has put his dick up people’s asses?

Why?!?

Bucky rubs gently, but Steve still arches, biting his lip at the discomfort and weird feeling of Bucky rubbing little circles all over his perineum. It’s weird. He’s pretty sure he doesn’t like it. And then.

It doesn’t take long before Steve’s limbs feel heavy and he’s trying hard not to grab his shaft. The circles are good. Winding him up tight with the need to come.

“I want to touch myself,” he whispers, half begging.

“Oh yeah? Where, sweetheart?”

He’s so turned on he doesn’t argue the nickname. “I want to jerk off. I need to come.”

“Can you stop yourself or do I need to tie you up?”

“What?” he asks, surprised and more than a little offended at the nerve of him. “Bucky, I _have_ to come. It’s not…this isn’t a game for me.”

Bucky pulls back, looks down Steve’s body. “You should be so wet right now, but you’re not. Your cock is mine. _I’m_ going to make you come. _I’m_ going to make you feel so fucking good. And I won’t torture you. As soon as we can get you to come, you’ll come. I promise. But, for now you gotta keep your hands to yourself.”

“Bucky,” he breathes, shifting restlessly. This is torture. He doesn’t know if he can do it. If Bucky understood how he felt, he wouldn’t ask this of him.

“Don’t you want what I want?” Bucky asks, pressing closer, resting his chest on top of Steve’s, letting Steve feel the weight of him.

“I do. But, I— _uhh_, I can’t. You have to help me.”

“Shh, hold on for a little longer. You’re close, baby. I promise you’re close,” his hand is still moving between Steve’s legs, palm and wrist bumping Steve’s swollen balls. “God, you’re going to leak everywhere. I’m going to have you soaking my hand and your stomach. It’s going to be a flood, you’re going to to be so wet. I think you’ll be embarrassed. God, I could come from the very idea of it. Isn’t that what you want to give to me?” he asks, and his hand is firmer now, thumb and pinky stroking near the seams of his thighs, and it’s like Bucky is trying to work all that swelling, all that backed up come into his balls and his shaft.

There’s a building feeling inside of him, too odd and spread out to be an orgasm but his breath is coming short and he needs to be closer to Bucky, needs more of him and he can’t even figure out how he wants him. He tries to twist closer and Bucky groans, grinding against Steve, finally some crack in his careful control. “Do you want me?” he asks, because Steve has to know.

“Always. Every minute of every day. You know that. You fucking _know_,” he grits out. And that’s what sends Steve over the edge, makes his body seize up in an endlessly tight spasm, as if all of him is contracting inwards. He can’t even breathe and then his body goes limp, as if all of him just opens. It’s not centered in his cock or even his balls, it’s weird and so good but scarily different. That is not how a normal orgasm feels.

“Beautiful. God, that was incredible. Look at you, baby,” he says, and Steve opens his eyes, sees his cock weakly spasming still, fluid pulsing out of him thickly, almost too dense and viscous. He covers his face, not wanting to see it, knowing this isn’t how it should be but a symptom of how unwell his body is.

“I think we can get you there again,” Bucky says, and Steve nods, thrusts his hips up, expecting to get a hand on his cock but Bucky doesn’t touch him there, instead his fingers make a V on either side of Steve’s cock, digging deep into the area along the side of his balls.

“Oh,_ shit_. No, no, _god_,” Steve cries out, his voice breaking and foreign. His hips jerk up and down, trying to shake Bucky’s hand off of him. He tries to lift his hands, to stop Bucky by physically pulling his hand away but that’s…he can’t do that.

Taking Bucky’s hand off him when this is what his dominant is giving him makes him feel sick to his stomach. Bucky wants this from him and some part of him knows he needs it. Steve’s cock, his balls, everything is Bucky’s to do with as he pleases, isn’t it? “Thank you. Stop. I _can’t_—“ He’s never sounded like this. Never felt like this, come oozing out of him in small hot spasms he can feel rolling up his shaft as Bucky rubs him and works the area.

He’s touching Steve like he’s a girl or some animal that needs to be expressed, like he’s just muscles that won’t release. It’s so breath sterlingly good but it’s wrong. It’s a knife’s edge of pleasure and pain and then there’s that build in him and he reaches for his cock to help it along, close to coming again.

“Get your hand off your fucking cock,” Bucky growls, and Steve stares at him, silently begging. “You’ll come this way. How I want you to.”

It’s sucking him under again and Steve shuts his eyes as the pain rises with the pleasure, muscles contracting hard again as he coils inwards, straining and then releases again in a sharp explosion.

“Good boy. Hush now. You’re okay, you’re perfect,” Bucky whispers, kissing him deeply. Steve is whimpering, crying with it all. “Look at the mess you made, my love,” Bucky pulls back, looks like he’s going to take what he needs from Steve and make it hurt.

Bucky’s eyes are a little wild, lips kiss swollen, dominant and shaking with the restraint he’s used, close to snapping. Steve is covered in come, a mess, utterly soaked and debauched with it. There’s come on his chest and his neck, sliding down his ribs, a large lake of it on his stomach.

“Over,” Bucky orders and he’s urging Steve over, unwilling to wait at all. Steve groans weakly, moving difficult and slow. “Fuck,” Bucky gasps, shoving Steve the rest of the way over, then dragging him to his knees with hard, heavy hands. Bucky fumbles with his pants, panting behind him as he gets his cock out. His hand reaches under Steve, swipes up come and he can hear the wet sound of Bucky jerking off behind him. Bucky touches Steve’s ass with his free hand, fondling the globe, pulling it open to look at Steve’s hole.

Which isn’t okay. It’s wrong enough, dirty enough that it sobers Steve up and he’s suddenly aware of where they are and what they’re doing. His gaze is fixated on Bucky’s sex kit. Bucky comes all over him with a long moan and Steve’s head drops back down to the ground, each spurt of come landing on him drags him deeper, back under.

It’s hot and humid in the tent, Steve reeks of his own come but now there’s Bucky’s too and some submissive part of his brain registers what’s happened and that it isn’t in him. 

Potent pheromones, chemicals, hormones and he needs them deep inside of his body where they belong. A stripe of come lands on his hole and it takes everything in him not to shove it inside him with his finger. _Fingers_. He should be wide open and receptive, just gaping in invitation so he can have Bucky’s come inside him.

It’s the most unsettling thought he’s ever had. Steve Rogers has never wanted anything like that. Couldn’t even really come up with the idea. It isn’t him. It sounds degrading and painful, it’s the thought of a degenerate.

It’s this poison inside him that makes him imagine that. Not want. He doesn’t want it. No one would want that.

_Except._

Apparently submissives do. Isn’t that why Bucky has all those things for sex? Because it isn’t kissing and missionary or whatever normal heterosexual people do. Sex is now complicated and shameful. There’s tools to help and lubricant that’s needed and dildos and—

It’s not him.

Not yet.

Steve _can’t_ become that. It’s like he isn’t the broken pervert who wants those things but it’s looming in front of him. 

He imagines his brain chemistry changing, making horrible thoughts pleasurable, like blood in water where everything becomes red. His mind is being saturated with hormones and ideas, seeping into every part of him and making him someone else. He might throw up.

But, physically he feels so good right now. That’s the worst of it. That he wants to slash the blood from his body and drain this poison out of him, go back to being what he was, and yet he also wants to feel this good for the rest of his life.

His fingers are clenched tight to his thigh so he doesn’t shove come into himself and beg Bucky to breed him like an animal.

Now that he knows what it’s like to get his needs met, it’s even worse than he ever imagined. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a few days where I was thinking this story was almost done. Story of my Stucky writing life, I was wrong. Pretty sure their whole dynamic changes because of this chapter so the story has at least 10k more to go I think. Should I tag for body horror? I may even have to tag for dubious consent. Why is the story going this way?!? If you liked this chapter, please let me know. I'm like Steve having my own little mental breakdown about what I've done here.


	7. Chapter 7

Steve took a long, hot shower and finally trudged back to the tent. Bucky was asleep. His first thought was that it made perfect sense for Bucky to be asleep, it wasn’t like he’d just undergone something earth-shattering and terrifying.

His second thought was that he was a complete and utter fucking asshole because Bucky had gone though a hell of a lot that was terrifying and horrible, it was just that it hadn’t had anything to do with his designation.

He slid into his sleeping bag and felt Bucky’s body behind him. He startled in surprise and sat up, trying to figure out what the hell had happened. “I zipped them together so we could be close.”

“Oh.” Steve laid back down, on his back and full of tension. Bucky was exhaling softly next to his ear, his arm, bare and warm, slid over Steve’s stomach. Impulsively, Steve turned and kissed him on the lips, let his body press flush against Bucky’s. Bucky hadn’t been hard but he felt the twitch of his cock against his own, Bucky’s hand slid down to his ass, grabbing a hold of one cheek and dragging him closer, tighter.

“I have to be up in five hours,” Bucky murmured into his mouth.

“I know. I just… I do love you, Buck.”

“I’m not being sent to the front lines tomorrow, am I?”

Steve pulled away from him, shifted to his back and snuggled closer, not questioning the desire to let Bucky be the big spoon. “Very funny. I’ve told you I loved you before.”

“Not when you were naked and I could grab your ass.”

Which was a fairly good point. Bucky kisses his shoulder, stubble rasping against his skin and making him shiver. “No regrets?”

“No regrets.” Bucky makes a pleased sound and relaxes, clearly ready to drift back to sleep.He needs to talk to Bucky about the ass stuff. But, it can wait. Bucky is here with him, everything is perfect.

***

Steve gets his four hours of sleep and wakes up feeling fantastic. He’s sore between his legs from what Bucky did to him the night before but it’s not bad. It makes him shiver to touch himself down there, gets his cock hard and leaking.

Leaking. He’s so happy about it he starts jerking off, not even thinking about the fact that he’s making a mess of their bedding, his cock dripping. A towel lands on his face and Steve freezes. “Don’t be a fucking savage. We have to sleep here, you know. In fact, that should be your mission. New bedding. Captain America shouldn’t have to sleep on come-soaked bedding.”

Steve pulls the towel off his face, uncertain what to do now. “Keep going,” Bucky orders, voice dark with lust. His hand slips down Steve’s back, along his spine and then, thankfully, veers off to grab his hip.

Steve gets a good grip on himself and starts jerking off again, slow and easy, his arousal dying a little at being caught. He can hear people outside the tent starting the day and walking around and it stresses him out. His balls are throbbing now and his perineum is all sore in a way that makes him want to stroke it. His ass feels empty, he needs….no, it doesn’t. He needs nothing to happen to his ass. Ever.

“I don’t know if I can do this with you watching me,” he says, suddenly drowning in frustration.

“I’m not watching you. You’re facing away from me.”

He squeezes his cock hard, hard enough to punish himself, hard enough that he hopes his dick gets the message that Steve isn’t a slave to this. He lifts his hand away from his cock, exhales slowly as he ignores the throbbing agony of denial.

It’s better this way. His body is a disaster. First, it was that he couldn’t come and it was all about the drugs. Now, all he could think about was coming and wanting Bucky to just fuck him into the ground and there had to be something in the middle.

Giving in now, getting used to this pleasure, to Bucky watching him, to half hoping that Bucky would be proactive and cajole Steve into giving him his ass….“I’m gonna get up,” he says.

Bucky puts a hand on the back of his neck and Steve slumps back down, his hand goes gratefully back to his cock. He closes his eyes and starts to stroke, the slightest pressure from Bucky enough to make him question everything, change everything. “Bucky. That’s not fair,” his voice comes out a desperate moan.

“Let’s get your day started off, right, sweetheart. You want to touch your cock? Go ahead. Do you want help?”

“You won’t…you won’t touch me back there, will you?”

“You mean your ass? Your _hole_?”

“I don’t want that,” Steve says, shivering. Steve’s hole is spasming, like it’s trying to relax or… it’s just weird and wrong.

“Then I won’t touch you there,” Bucky says, like it’s not a big deal. Fingers are on Steve’s balls, pressing and stroking, like he’s searching for something. Steve isn’t doing anything more than holding his shaft loosely now, his movements paused while every part of his body throbs in anticipation of Bucky’s touch.

Steve’s hand is useless now. He doesn’t want it. His body is practically non-responsive to the tentative touches he half-heartedly makes. He wants Bucky. He needs him. Bucky keeps rubbing at him, tugging his balls gently and then pressing the heel of his hand in deep where it shouldn’t feel good.

Steve comes abruptly and swears, jerks his cock but has to let go because it’s so oversensitive and he doesn’t have the grip right. It’s like his touching himself is stopping the flow rather than helping. He grabs Bucky’s hand instead, where it’s still cupped protectively over Steve’s balls, minute movements of his wrist making the spasms go on and on until he whimpers and then finally begs Bucky to stop.

“Little longer, sweetheart. You’ve gotta go til you calm down again.”

Steve doesn’t know what that means but he turns his head into the pillow and groans, body struggling to let Bucky keep going when it’s almost agony. “So good, you’re still coming, sweetheart. You’re going to feel so good when this is over, I swear.”

He’s shaking apart, wants it to never end but needs it to stop. “There you go, you’re almost there, the trembling is good, you’re gonna come again. Don’t fight it, sweetheart.”

“No,” he whimpers. He isn’t going to come. This is torture and Bucky should stop.

“Stevie. Come now.” He stops shaking, all muscles locked as he releases again. And then he’s spent. Slumped and exhausted, panting heavily. “I don’t think I’ll ever move again.” 

“I’m glad it was good.” Bucky kisses his neck.

“What about you?” he asks, going to his back and looking at Bucky. Bucky is flushed with arousal, cock hard and Steve wraps a hand around him, enjoying touching him. He’s hot and hard, the skin is delicate. How bizarre that this could hurt him.

“I want to come all over you.”

“I have to shower, anyway,” he offers, blushing at the idea. He touches Bucky’s chest, the delineation of his muscles from his pecs to his stomach.

Bucky growls. “I know you’re going to wash it off. Jesus. Give me a fantasy for a minute.”

Oh. He wants Steve to stay covered in his come? “I won’t then,” Steve says, hand sliding down to wrap around Bucky’s cock, cupping his balls as Bucky strokes himself and ogles Steve’s body. “I’ll rub it into me and smell like you all day along. I’ll be sticky with it. Spend all day wanting more, wanting you to come in my mouth and on my face and—“

“Fucking hell,” Bucky groans and he comes on Steve’s stomach, kissing him sloppily, hips working as he spurts his release. “I think they should cancel the war. I want to do this in a bed with you, without threat of dying or hearing some jack ass talking about his dirty drawers while I’m rubbing off on you.”

“Yeah, that’s Hendricks. Sounds like a problem.” Bucky buries his head in Steve’s neck, as they laugh quietly and listen to Hendricks bitch very, very loudly.

“I don’t want that to be a problem I’m aware of.”

He kisses Bucky’s face and finally Bucky gets off of him. Steve gets up, grabs his shower stuff. “Where are you going?” Bucky demands.

“To take a shower,” Steve says, totally clueless as to what Bucky is scowling for. “Wait. You know I was kidding, right? I’m not gonna walk around camp all day reeking of your come. That was just dirty talk.”

“Figures,” Bucky says, like he’s actually insulted. His cheeks turn pink and he seems to genuinely be irritated. “Anyway, it’s your loss,” Bucky says, like an ass.

Steve can’t help but laugh at the idea. It might come across as a little mean. “How do you figure?”

“I’m just telling you your biology. You’re laughing now and saying you don’t want it. But, I bet you do. You’re just not happy about it. If you don’t get to control it, you’re pissed.”

“Who the hell would be happy about wandering around reeking of come and having it dried all over them?” Steve demands. Bucky rolls his eyes. “I think you’re depraved,” Steve says, giving him his back.

Bucky grabs him by the arm, pulls him close, clearly furious. “I know this is new to you, so I’m trying to be understanding, but you telling me you don’t want my come is a big deal.”

“What? No, I… it’s not meant to be a _rejection_ or whatever. Come on, you can’t mean it.”

“If I’m your dominant then you want me inside and out,” he says, biting out every word. “I know you’re feeling precious about your ass and your delicate sensibilities, but make no mistake that if I wanted inside you, it’d be happening and you’d be _begging_ me for it. I’ll let you play the reluctant virgin, and I’ll let you pretend you don’t want what I’m giving you, but there are times where you better say thank you and not be a total fucking asshole to me.”

Steve jerks away from him, shocked and angry at the outburst. “You’re fucking loving this, aren’t you? Having me needing you. And…I do. I _do_,” he says, holding out a hand placatingly, taking a deep breath because he doesn’t want to say something he regrets. He’s not trying to be an asshole, this is hard. “You’re my…dominant.” It’s a weird thing to say. Bucky’s gaze narrows at him, lips hardening into a flat line.

“It’s difficult to get used to wanting these things. I’m sorry you were offended. But, you can’t assume I’m like all submissives, either. You coming all over me and me being reminded of that as I go about my day and meet people I respect and need to impress, that’s not… I’m sorry but I _don’t_ want that. I_ never_ will. And… I know you want anal sex. But, it’s not necessary for this to work between us and I don’t want that or want you to pressure me into it.” 

Bucky points a finger at him, then drops it, shoulders slumping. “This will be where we fall apart. You want me to make you, to make this easy for you, and you also don’t want to give me what I need to reassure me that this is… right for you. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life thinking you don’t want all of me.”

“I want your cock. Happy? I want it. I don’t want it up my ass. And I don’t want to bathe in your come. That’s not complicated or dickish. It just isn’t.”

Bucky shrugs, giving up. Steve knows that look. It means Bucky’s decided Steve is beyond reason and is now going to wait until shit goes wrong, then swoop in and pick up the pieces.

“This is my _life_,” Steve says, voice shaking. “And you’re making it about your ego.”

His voice is very flat when Bucky says, “I’m sorry your designation means you want stuff from me and you’re now experiencing self-loathing. I have _no idea_ what that’s like. I’m sure it’s tough for you. Go ahead and take your shower. If you’re feeling like a brave boy you can stick a finger up your ass and I’ll bet you can get three fingers in there without it even burning. If you’re my submissive, you want me there as much as I want you. We’ll both be happier once you fucking get over yourself.”

Steve leaves the tent. Bucky’s damned lucky he didn’t hit him. By the time he’s soaping up he’s worked himself into such a righteous fury about the whole thing that he decides he will stick a finger up his ass. If for no other reason then to prove Bucky wrong. A spiteful anal fingering. How can this be his life?

Bucky is wrong, he tells himself just before the first touch. Then he touches himself. His knees almost buckle and he leans against the flimsy wall. His rim is so sensitive he buries his face in his arm, bites his own forearm as he tries to process the pleasure that’s coursing through his body. He doesn’t do one finger but two, his ass swallowing them easily. His hole is relaxed and swollen, _receptive_.

He goes for a third and works them in and out quickly. It’s so fucking good. And it isn’t enough. He can’t get deep enough. There’s an itch in him, like a burning just beyond his fingers. He needs to be soothed, he needs Bucky to make it better. And just like that his mind is thinking about come, about Bucky’s come and how good it would feel inside him. How soothing it would be.

The temptation to go back to their tent and bend over for Bucky’s cock is intense. Impossible to resist. He’d just bitched to Bucky that he’d never want him like this and now he does. How does he change from one moment to the next?

It’s like just that bit of fingering changed him. What will he become when Bucky actually fucks him? It’s an awful thought. So awful that he holds out for another few minutes and actually washes the rest of himself.

And then he’s back to his balls, to his perineum, fingers pressing into his hole, dipping inside, legs widening and pressing deep.

Screw it. He doesn’t care if he’s wrong or even if Bucky gloats at how needy Steve is. If Bucky wants to fuck him in the ass and it’s going to feel as good as Steve fears it will then fine.

Steve gets back to their tent andBucky is gone. Probably to breakfast. There’s a runner waiting by his tent to escort him to medical for blood work and then to the general.

The general makes him wait for an hour. The doctor who took his blood goes in before Steve, looking at Steve with a worried smile before closing the door behind him.

The doctor comes out and another ten minutes go by. This is bullshit. That’s when Peggy shows up. “Captain. There’s a change in plans, I’m afraid. You’ll be needed in London for a few days.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. Believe it or not, people don’t tell me everything.” Her smile is sharp as she says it. He goes back to his tent but Bucky still isn’t there. He grabs some stuff and hesitates, wondering if he should leave a note. He doesn’t like leaving it where they did. In the end, he has no idea what to say so he gets on a jeep, is taken to a plane and flown to London. Twelve hours later he’s in a room with Howard Stark.

“I thought you were in New York.”

“I’d like to be in New York,” Howard deadpans. He’s looking at Steve like he’s an intriguing insect. “So, your blood work came back radically different then it was before. Just wondering what’s changed. You’re gonna need new meds it looks like.”

_Bucky._ “How has it changed?” he asks, going for innocent. Howard raises both brows then slams them down into a frown. “You ever want to play poker, give me a call. Not like I need the money, but how many people get to say they beat Captain America at poker?”

“What?”

“You’re a_ terrible_ liar. Just _awful_. So, what’s going on. Who, what, when, where and why?”

“I honestly don’t know what you mean.”

Howard sighs. “Steve. We take your blood every day. The last few days, your blood work has altered. It looks like a lot of the dominant markers have been suppressed or just erased. Things we see under the microscope, expect to see in a dominant of your level, are gone.”

“I’m not dominant.” In some weird way, it’s a relief to say it and know it’s true.

“That’s how it’s looking. Sorry, kid.”

“Yeah,” he says, thinking about how the anger is harder to find than usual. Howard looks at him like maybe Steve deserves to be pitied.

“This is a bit of a military disaster, you know? You’re not going to be able to tell anyone the truth. Whoever your partner is will need to sign non-disclosure agreements and will be assigned to you for the duration of the war. If they bug the shit out of you, now is the time to speak up. Who is it?”

“I’m not comfortable saying yet. I need to discuss it with…them,” he says, playing for time.

Howard snorts. “There’s one woman. And Peggy ain’t dominant no matter how pointy that woman’s shoes are. I don’t care if you got yourself a fella. The military has no choice but to accept it and keep it all on the quiet. I’m very forward thinking, you know. Give me a rule and I want to break it. Give me a puritanical rule and… well. I understand the charms is all I’m saying.”

“It’s illegal.”

Howard shrugs. “Not too long ago alcohol was illegal in America, too. People still drank and now we all go to bars and have a good time. You reducing your meds and being able to function is all that matters. Everything else can be covered for.”

Steve blushes, but doesn’t have too much to say to that. Howard gets called outside by a general and Steve realizes he’s being watched through the glass.

Howard comes back in. “Apparently, your partner is to remain a secret for a bit longer while they talk to Washington and figure out how big the circle of knowledge will be. On the plus side, your boys are on their way over for a free weekend.” Howard slips Steve a piece of paper. He opens it up. The Wolf Club is all it says. He gives Howard a questioning look.

“Bit of an open secret in London. It’s a club. Men only. Designation only. Very exclusive. No one will give you any trouble. Try to get yourselves sorted out, when this little honeymoon is over, they’re going to have your ass all over Europe.”

Steve stands up to go and Howard rubs a finger under his mustache nervously. “So, look. I know we’ve had trouble with the doses. And you could try going off everything, see how that does you for, but uh, you’re not fully leveled off with your designation. Over the next few weeks you’ll likely become more submissive in certain parts of your life. The military is a little concerned. We have a new formula, totally different type of drug and hormone cocktail that will preserve you as much as possible.”

“I don’t want any more drugs,” he says, flatly.

“I understand. It’s your choice. _But_, maybe you just think about it. Over the next few days if you start thinking things you didn’t think before, wanting stuff that you never wanted. You don’t have to completely let that happen to you. You’ll still be submissive. No one will try to change you into a dominant anymore. That’s over. If you think of the submissive designation as a cold, this is a dose of vitamins to help you get through it.”

“No. No more drugs,” he says, knowing that’s the right call.

****

He’s just coming out of military headquarters, chatting with Peggy about the next meeting when Bucky calls his name. Steve knows that the ridiculous grin on his face is an exact copy of Bucky’s. Bucky looks so good Steve can’t hardly breathe. Even his clothes are new. He’s clean and clean-shaven, his hair cut and utterly beautiful.

“Buck,” he breathes, enveloping him in a hug and breathing him in. He pushes away from him because he wants him too badly to deal with a casual touch.

“Sargent,” Peggy says, annoyed. She leaves. Bucky reaches out a hand, touches Steve’s cheek and jaw for a moment before pulling away. “Well, if she didn’t know about us before she does now. You didn’t even acknowledge her when she left. You forgive me for being a jerk?”

“Doyou forgive me for being a jerk?”

Bucky chuckles, clearly relieved. “I just… it’s you.”

“Yeah. Us. I get it. I’m sorry, too.” _Now please fuck me_, he almost says.

“So, what are you up to?” Bucky asks, gaze intent on Steve’s mouth. Bucky puts hands in his pockets and Steve tracks the movement, suspects Bucky’s adjusting his hardening cock.

“I need you. God. But, um… I’m currently on my way to an incredibly boring meeting. But I should be done around 6 if you’re free. Wait, shit. I have to be at a dinner thing at 7:30.”

“Then I’ll see you at 6 and I’ll get you whereyou need to be for 7:30,” he says, voice low with promise as he takes a step closer.

“Yeah, Buck. Yes.”

****

Peggy will barely look at him when they get to their next meeting. She doesn’t understand because she has no designation. It makes no sense to her that for the first time since he left Bucky a few days ago, he actually feels awake and alive. She doesn’t understand that he’s sitting in this chair and all he’s thinking is that he’s going to let Bucky fuck him later.

He doesn’t want Bucky to have to ask him for it. He wants to offer himself. It’s a commitment. An acceptance that they are in this together, that Bucky is his to take care of and that he will. And that he trusts Bucky to take care of him. In the most intimate of ways.

Offering his ass seems…romantic. That’s not the sort of thing one says aloud.

The meeting ends and he stands up, pulling his files closer, and using the opportunity to make sure no one can see how hard he is from all his fantasizing. “If Erskine could see you now,” Peggy mutters, under her breath.

“What does that mean?” he asks, as everyone else shuffles out.

“You were so lost to lust you didn’t even pay attention, did you? You’d let the whole world burn for him, wouldn’t you?”

“You’re being overdramatic.”

“We talked about how irresponsible it would be to make that push into Belgium, how many lives would be lost. And it just happened. You were supposed to speak up. You didn’t. Those lives will be on you.”

“Peggy, wait.”

“No, that’s Agent Carter to you. Friends call me Peggy. I don’t know who you are anymore. You have no self-preservation, no autonomy now that you’ve embraced being a submissive. You are behaving as every bad stereo-type. I am begging you to let Howard give you that drug. Your country needs you, the war needs you. Prioritizing one man over everything else doesn’t make you a hero.”

“If I need drugs to make me into a hero then maybe I’m not one.”

She gives him a look. It actually takes him a second to understand what she means. Right. He’s only a hero because of the serum. Sometimes he forgets, as ridiculous as that sounds.

“The purpose of this formula is to help you function in the field. It is a supplement to your dominant. I’m not saying you shouldn’t be happy or live your life, I’m just saying that there are other demands on you that you can’t ignore, just because you want to fuck your lover.” She rolls her eyes. “Or should I say, let your lover fuck you.”

She can’t actually know that he’s been fantasizing about it since he saw Bucky. But, he blushes all the same. Giving Bucky everything, as it pertains to his body, feels like the right decision. His gut, his heart, hell, the throbbing in his ass is telling him this is the most urgent thing in the entire world.

And yet.

He didn’t feel that way before he saw him again, smelled him, hugged him. What sorts of things would he think after he let Bucky fuck him? Who would he be then?

He goes to find Howard.

***

His meeting with Howard took longer than expected and he doesn’t get to meet up with Bucky until after all the meetings are over. It’s now almost 10pm and they’re in a pub. Bucky is watching him drink. He’s been moving closer and closer, his gaze getting hotter and hotter. The bar is noisy, overly crowded and any space they had between them has disappeared. 

He reaches a hand out, grabs Steve gently by the shirt and tugs him closer. Steve’s eyes widen, his breath catches in his throat. He leans close, Bucky’s lips graze his ear.

“It’s weird. I used to spend a lot of time looking at your mouth. And I’ve been here all night doing the same thing, watching you drink and smile and I just realized, I don’t have to wait. You come with me right now and I’m gonna have you on your knees.”

“Fuck,” he whispers.

“Second thoughts?” Bucky asks, pulling back, giving him a second to think about an answer.

“No. Definitely not.”

Bucky nods, looking very serious. “I want to get out of here now. Do you?”

Steve swallows hard. Nods.

“Say it,” he orders.

“I want to get out of here.” Steve blushes.

Bucky smiles at him, slow and predatory.

“Thank Christ. Come on, sweetheart.” He turns and walks out, Steve trailing along behind him. His cock is hard before they’re out of the bar. Bucky starts walking, their accommodations are the other direction and he’s not sure if Bucky’s aware he’s going the wrong direction when he stops.

“So, I know you think this designation thing is weird. I’m happy to go back to our place but there is another option. A club, lots of guys just like us go there. Might be good for you. Not feel quite so alone.”

Steve pats his pocket. “Is it the Wolf Club?”

Bucky gives him an impressed look.

He shrugs, unwilling to take the credit. “Howard told me the name.”

“I think you’ll be surprised how many of our guys are there.”

“You want to go?” Steve asks, reaching for Bucky’s hand.

“Yeah. I do. But, you might find it shocking.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“You’re beautiful. Come on, doll.”

The club is dark, smoke-filled, the smell of alcohol and pheromones making Steve reach out and grab onto Bucky. “Jesus,” he says, pressing closer. His cock is hard and throbbing. They’re barely in the door before Steve is on him, kissing his neck, hands down to grab at Bucky’s ass and haul him closer, grinding his cock against Bucky’s.

“Wait. Um, we should talk about this probably. I don’t want you to be pissed at me later.”

“I won’t. Oh my God, can we get off here? I want to touch you. Get my mouth on you. A bathroom?”

Bucky pushes him back, looks him up and down, hot and hungry. “Yeah, don’t worry. We can get off here,” he says and he leads them deeper into the club. There’s tables and couches, large chairs and everywhere men are writhing against each other, jerking each other off, blowjobs are common place and there’s more than a few men getting bent over and fucked.

Even he wants it. His body is trying valiantly to respond despite the new medication he’d gotten from Howard this afternoon…in the form of asuppository. Despite having designation dampening medicine directly in his rectum, all he can think about is how good it would undoubtedly feel if he let Bucky bend him over. From the look of lust and relief on the men’s faces, it must feel amazing.

And, even more compelling than that is the look on the dominant’s faces as they are buried in their submissives. It’s ecstasy. Protectiveness. Devotion. Connection.

He turns to look at Bucky. Finds him looking back, trying, as ever, to read Steve and figure out how he feels about all this. A flash of something crosses his face. He grips Steve by the shoulder. “Don’t worry. I’ve had time to think about the other day. Anal is out. We’ll be okay, sweetheart,” he says, and he moves it to kiss Steve. Lips soft with promise, like he’s trying to communicate his acceptance and unwavering devotion to Steve. It makes him feel like a coward.

“Buck. After the war is over. When we’re home in Brooklyn, I want to do everything with you.” He means it. He will. They will. He does love Bucky and when they get out of here they’ll see who they really are together. They’ll try.

“Then I guess we better make it out of here alive,” he says, and then someone is shouting in Steve’s ear.

“Bucky!” They both turn and Dum Dum is coming closer to them. “Captain,” he says, appraisingly, voice a little slurred with drink. “I know Buck’s a dom. Does this mean you’re his?”

“Uh, yeah. It does,” Steve says, chin jutting up a little. Dum Dum claps him on the shoulder. “Good man. We gotta stick together.” And then Gabe comes up, linking hands with Dum Dum and hauling him away.

“Expecting quite the ruckus, Barnes,” Gabe calls over his shoulder.

Steve turns back to him, confused. He thinks Bucky is blushing but he’s not sure. “The Wolf Club. The joke is that the men who come here don’t leave until they’ve howled in pleasure.”

“Oh, it doesn’t sound like the worst thing in the world.”

Bucky kisses him hard, nips at his neck. “What do you think, sweetheart? You want to howl for me?”

Steve is suddenly serious. He presses his forehead to Bucky’s, touches his chest gently. “I do, Buck.”

They can figure out the rest of it later. After the war,they’ll finally be together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry there was a bit of a delay for this chapter. I got a bit stalled out on the story. 
> 
> As we all know, Bucky never made it out of the war. And Steve went down with the Valkyrie. But, I really like the idea of him waking up in 2012 and finally coming to terms with his designation...if only Bucky was somehow still alive!
> 
> I don't know how much is left of this story. I think i've struggled with it because of Sniper and my concern of it being repetitive. Finding the angle has been tricky.


	8. Chapter 8

Defrosting wasn’t as painful as getting the serum, but it went on for a hell of long longer and the only way to describe it is unbearable. He’s hot and cold at the same time, as if all of him has some sort of freezer burn and can’t adjust to the warmth properly. They try to increase his temperature slowly, but it’s not a science or something anyone has really done before, and he alternates between screaming at the sensation of fire inside him, blood boiling, the very air in his lungs a torture, and to shaking with cold so hard they have him biting on leather so he doesn’t lose his damned teeth. 

Finally, he can ask a question. “Why…not…dead?” he asks, a whisper of sound, because all of his skin is strangely rotting and sloughing off inside and out of him as his body heals seventy years of being frozen. The doctor who is leaning over him blinks, frowns at him and then they’re giving him more drugs and he passes out again.

Bucky is in his dreams. Bucky is falling away from the train and Steve is in the Valkyrie plummeting after him so they can die together, and those are somehow easier than the other dreams. 

He also hears echoes of Bucky’s voice in his head pleading with Steve to make different decisions, to not be so reckless, to trust Bucky with his heart and not just his life. He wants all of Steve’s body and Steve is saying no, refusing to give him what they both want and everything goes dark.

Bucky is dead and gone and this is one more thing he never said when he had the chance. “I want to go with you,” Steve tells Bucky in the last dream, just before he wakes up in a hospital room in the year 2012.

Bucky smiles at him with love…. and then it’s a sneer, and it ends with hard loathing as he leans closer to Steve— Steve can feel the press of his cheek against his, feel the slight disturbance of air near his ear— as Bucky responds. “You don’t deserve to come with me, Steve.”

And he wakes up to the sound of an old ballgame on the radio. Steve escapes and is surrounded by noise and lights and it’s so constantly loud that he never hears Bucky’s voice in his head again.

“I know you have a lot of questions and probably a lot of emotion regarding everything you’ve gone through but some of that is being exacerbated by your hormones and designation,” the doctor says, a few days later.

“I’m not a dominant,” he says, because he doesn’t fucking care. If anything has seemed less important now than his designation and his precious ego about the whole thing he doesn’t know what it is.

“Uh, no you’re not. So, they really believed that back then, huh? Crazy. Captain Rogers, there have been numerous advances in designational research since the 40’s. Our understanding of designations on a cellular level and how it affects blood chemistry, mood and behaviors, is drastically different then it was. The markers in your blood that led them to conclude you had dominance in your system was actually a byproduct of the Submissive Bond that you had with your dominant. They just didn’t know any better back in the day.”

Wait. What now? “Are you saying I was never a dominant?”

“No, I’m afraid not. By the time you were given the serum you were already bonded.”

“Bonded… that’s not a word we had back then,” he says. The doctor is all sympathy.

“It’s the vernacular term for a process that happens to a very small percentage of the population where one meets someone they are so compatible with that their designational chemistry perfectly aligns. It would likely be impossible for you to have another relationship with a dominant without careful medication. Your body would reject anyone else.”

“Good,” he says. He doesn’t want to ever want anyone else anyway.

“Well, unfortunately, Sargent Barnes is deceased, and your body won’t like that, either.” The shock he feels must show on his face.

“You don’t know it was Barnes,” Fury says, stepping away from the wall where he’d been quietly listening.

The doctor blushes. “Well, it’s really the only possibility. He was bonded before the serum and he’d lived with James Barnes, a dominant, for years, grew up with him. The Captain’s liberation of the prisoners at Azzano makes a lot more sense if it was to save his dominant. Is there another option, Captain?”

“No,” he says, “It was always Bucky.” The look she gives him, sad and a little emotional confuses him.

“Most likely they bonded right at puberty.”

“Spare me the romantic drivel, what does he need to do now?”

She shoots Fury an annoyed look. “Why do men always think that war is more valid than love?”

“Considering the dominant in question has been dead longer than Steve’s been frozen I can’t see how it’s relevant at all. What I _need_ is a mentally stable Captain America who’s not going to crash another plane and try to kill himself because his hormones are all fucked up.”

“Obviously, we can’t take away your grief, Captain. But we can make sure your designation stays dormant until you’re ready. We custom make suppressants now. You’ll have no designational response and…the side effects you experienced in the 40’s, that’s not a concern anymore.”

He’s going to agree but there’s just one part of this that he’s not quite been able to grasp. Maybe he hasn’t wanted to. “Sorry, are you saying I was _always_ a submissive?” he asks, because the pieces finally add up.

“Yes, but you were bonded very young and so ill that it looks like your nature was suppressed heavily by your various illnesses.”

He wants to die.

That means he’d always belonged to Bucky. And he’d done all that he could to keep him at bay. “How did he feel?” he asks, and his voice breaks. “I rejected him at every turn. He knew we were supposed to be together. All those years. All that time,” he says, voice breaking as he sobs. “What did that do to him?”

Weight crushes down on him, his vision goes spotty and he can’t hear anyone above the sudden ringing noise droning in his head. For the first time since the serum, he faints. 

***

Steve takes one pill and gets an injection every week and he feels basically like a normal person. There are times where he is vividly reminded of his submissive nature.

Sometimes, a particularly dominant person will come into the room and Steve has the urge to drop his gaze. He doesn’t, but it makes him feel a little nauseous to resist.

And he doesn’t really jerk off anymore. He doesn’t have much of a sex drive and finds that if he takes care of things in the shower in the morning he’s usually fine. Every now and again he’ll dream of Bucky. And it’s both glorious and a torture. Those are the days where he wakes up and finds he’s come in his sleep or he’ll have two fingers buried in his ass, some part of him apparently aware enough to use his own come as lube.

The fact that he’ll come and then still finger himself in his sleep seems a bit excessive but it’s pretty hard to dispute his somnophiliac actions, so there it is.

The other time his designation flares up is in response to some of the modern advertisements. Billboards that advertise to dominants and submissive, created to draw attention and titillate. It’s essentially porn on the streets! For a gay, submissive man, he doesn’t have to search at all to see an ad or a commercial that’s so suggestive and shocking that it makes him hard. 

The biggest problem with the days where he dreams of Bucky is that he’s a mess for the rest of it. He’ll wind up in tears at some point and it’s after a particularly disastrous meeting where he both blinked away tears in a meeting and then almost got himself killed on a mission later that day that means he’s back in medical, Phil Coulson standing over his shoulder trying to be helpful.

Ever since he’d saved Phil’s life from Loki, the man has done his level best to be Steve’s best friend. He doesn’t ask questions about the past, which is something. But, there was one night, when Phil had him and a few others over for poker, that Steve saw a framed black and white picture on the wall, of the Howling Commandos with everyone’s signature except for Bucky’s. Phil had collected the signatures over the years. Gone to interviews and book signings. Steve hadn’t done very well at poker and he’d had to go home early.

Anyway, now he’s in medical and everyone is very concerned with finding a way to keep Steve from doing something suicidally reckless. “The procedure is actually fairly simple for most people. It’s a blood transfusion and a course of drugs that were originally meant to be anti-viral’s but have been shown effective at designation suppression for the immune system. If you were a normal person I’d say you’d be cured in two weeks.

_Cured_. “And then I’d have no designation?” he asks, voice rough.

“Exactly. For someone so strongly bonded to a deceased dominant it might be the best course of action for your mental health.”

It feels like a betrayal. He owes Bucky his grief.

“I can’t imagine Bucky would have wanted you to go through this pain, Steve,” Phil says, as if he actually knew Bucky. He’s not wrong, though. Bucky loved him so much, more than anything, that he definitely would have understood Steve taking a final solution to eradicate his designation.

“I tried something like this in 1943,” he says.

“I don’t have that in your file,” the doctor says, slowly.

“No, it was experimental. Something Howard tried. It worked a bit. Reduced how much I needed him. How often and how intensely,” he says, flushing red in shame. Phil hands him a tissue. How had Bucky endured it? To want Steve so much and be constantly rejected? If he could do it again, if he had the chance to go back, there wouldn’t be any hesitation.

He sees something like a flinch cross Coulson’s face.

“Yeah, that created a stressful couple of months,” Steve says, answering his unasked question. “But, that was Bucky. Selfless. To a fault.”

“He loved you. He was your dominant.”

Steve shrugs. He doesn’t need to have his decisions defended. He made them. He’s the one who gets to regret them for the rest of his life. “I don’t want to erase it. This is how I am. It’s who I am. What’s left of me if I don’t even get to love him anymore?”

Someone has to mourn Bucky. He deserves shrines and monuments, deserves to be remembered and honored. And Steve doesn’t deserve to get off lightly.

This is his penance.

***

Wanda takes the chocolate bar from her friend in the black mask. He’s a killer like she is. Maybe that’s why he protects her. He recognizes a kindred spirit. Her abilities are deemed to be more interesting and to have more potential than her brother’s. They let her out more, let her go places, and always she has her guard in the black mask.

He touched her hair once and the way he did it, tentative, uncertain, it was like he’d known someone with hair like hers and was trying to remember who it was.

His mind is filled with blankness. So much blankness that he sometimes forgot who she was for a little while. But, he always remembered. A single touch and she could help him remember.

She’s seen his dreams before. His fears. He fears the cold and falling. He fears illnesses and a small blond boy who becomes a young man and then dies. He fears their handlers and she thinks that if he didn’t have to protect her he’d go walk off a mountain and try falling one more time.

Her protector gets sent away when everything goes to hell and Ultron arrives. He finds her in New York when she’s settled down with the Avengers. He doesn’t want to meet them. He goes with her to visit her brother’s grave. He still brings her chocolate. She is beginning to have other people in her life.

He still has no one but her.

He doesn’t need a key to her apartment. He can just get in. She’s sworn Jarvis to secrecy about her friend and although he isn’t happy about it, he allows it to happen. Probably because he doesn’t stay long.

And then, one day, she comes back from training and Steve is with her. She’s going to lend him a book and when she opens the door she’s laughing but she looks around, knowing he’s somewhere in her apartment. He’s very good at hiding.

Steve comes into her apartment, still chuckling and stops abruptly. He absently reaches for his shield but isn’t wearing it. “Jarvis, is there anyone else here?” he asks, voice rough.

“No,” Wanda says, quickly. Thankfully, Jarvis doesn’t respond. “I’ll go get the book,” she says, and goes to her bedroom. She opens the door and he’s there, sitting on a chair in the corner of the room. His gaze is flat. He’s wearing the mask. She rolls her eyes at him. He reaches forward like he’s going to take back the chocolate bar that’s sitting on her bed.

“Don’t even think about it,” she whispers. He hands her the book. She turns around and goes back out. Steve is coming closer, staring intently at her door. “Were you talking to someone?”

“Here is the book,” she says, because she doesn’t want to lie to Steve. If her friend wants to stay a secret then she will honor that. She owes him that much.

He blinks and puts a hand on his stomach. His cheeks turn pink like he’s embarrassed. His hand shakes when he takes the book. “Are you alright?” she asks.

“Could I…could I have some water?” he asks. She moves past him towards the kitchen and he says he’s going to go to the bathroom. She gets the water but her bathroom door is open and empty. She pushes open the bedroom door and finds him sitting in the chair where her friend was. He’s holding the candy bar in his hands, staring at it like it’s cyanide.

The window is open. Her friend is gone. “You are very pale,” she says, and holds out the water. She puts a hand on his forehead and he’s hot. Flushed.

“Was someone here?” he asks her, and there’s tears in his eyes.

She shrugs, helplessly. “Who would be here?” He sits in her chair and sobs. Jarvis knocks on her door and stares at Wanda in a way that makes her feel like she is doing wrong by Steve. None of it makes sense. Except… except she supposes he looks like the young man the Soldier mourned.

Steve leaves and Jarvis is instantly in her room. “What is the identity of your friend who comes to visit? He has no finger prints and I have not seen enough of his face to find an answer.”

“He likes his privacy. You’re worse than the KGB,” she says, trying to deflect.

“That is untrue. His presence upset Captain Rogers. The way the Captain’s vitals fluctuated indicates the man is a dominant and the Captain is for some reason very susceptible to him. That puts the Captain at risk.”

“And my friend? Did he have a reaction?” Wanda asks after a moment.

“Not that I could discern. Heart rate, temperature, breathing patterns, nothing altered when the Captain was here.”

“What did Steve look like before the serum?” she asks, curious. Jarvis shows her a picture. It doesn’t make any sense that the man her friend remembers is Steve before the serum. She makes one more search, using the limited amount of information she has: Steve Rogers submissive.

And there is a picture of the Soldier. His name was James Barnes and he’s been dead for a very long time.

***

Steve is burning up. He can hardly catch a breath everything feels so odd. Every part of him is pulsing, from his fingertips to his toes to his…. Yeah. And he’s shaking. He’s cold in his stomach, even in his chest and his throat, like he’s filled with ice cold water and yet he’s hot too, hot in his groin and his ass, his lips tingle and his palms itch with the need to touch something.

They’d wanted to take him to the doctor. He wasn’t going to the fucking doctor. Whatever this was, yeah, it was weird and maybe even a problem but it was also….good.

Torturously so.

All he can think about is Bucky. He’d walked into Wanda’s bedroom, drawn there without having any idea why, had gone straight to the chair and sat down and had felt like he was sinking into himself and back in time. He could suddenly remember exactly how Bucky sounded when he was about to come, the way his fingers would tense on Steve’s body, the hard line of his back against him.

At the end they’d had a lot of inter-crural sex. Steve on his stomach and Bucky over him, grinding against him, groaning in Steve’s ear and it was so damned close to what they both wanted but had both let go of once Steve started on Howard’s new regime.He remembered the feel of vaseline on his fingers, the smell of Bucky’s sweat.

He wasn’t going to the doctor.

There was a decent chance he wouldn’t be able to endure this much memory and loss for very long but for now….he wanted to wallow in it. Drown in his loss and who he ached for.

***

The Soldier came back when Steve had been gone for a few hours. He stopped inside her bedroom, next to the window and looked around. He went back to the chair and stared at it like it was a snake.

“I think I know who you used to be,” she says, to him.

He takes off the mask. Now that she knows who she’s looking for it’s clearly him. “James Buchanan Barnes. Steve called you Bucky. Did you leave because of him?”

“I don’t know,” he says, after a long moment. Which isn’t very helpful. Which part doesn’t he know? Who he was or why he left? Both?

“He thinks you’re dead. He still loves you a great deal.”

“I don’t have any memory of him. I don’t know who he was to me. I can’t imagine what he wants.”

She snorts. “He’ll probably want to bang your brains out. You two were romantically involved. You both have designations and bonded intensely.”

Bucky looks back at the chair. Like he might pick it up and walk off with it. “I don’t know him,” he says.

“Then I guess you have to ask yourself if you want to know him?”

He shakes his head, clearly not knowing that either.

“You always helped me. How do I help you now?” she asks him.

“I don’t need help.” He turns to leave.

“Wait. Should I call you Bucky?”

He frowns. “It doesn’t seem like a good name.”

“I could help you remember?” she offers.

“Yes,” he agrees.

He sits down. She gets to work.

**

Steve can’t sleep. He’s trying. He’s _been_ trying. He gets up to take a shower. He’s just so damned uncomfortable. And his body is in overdrive. He’s sweating and hard, cock beading at the tip with come (but not nearly enough of it) and his ass is throbbing with a horrible emptiness. It’s definitely looking like he’s going to need to go to the doctor tomorrow. This was supposed to be over.

He gets in the shower and starts to feel dizzy, somehow slips and he hears the crack of his head before he loses consciousness.

Steve wakes up in his own bed. He puts a hand to his head, trying to remember what happened. His hair is still damp.

“It’s my fault,” Bucky says, and Steve pushes up to look at him. He’d know his voice anywhere, be able to identify any variation of it. There is a man in his room, his outline is identical to Bucky’s. He’s shirtless and has a metal arm that glints in the moonlight. He doesn’t understand what, _who_, he’s looking at.

“I think my pheromones are causing you severe physiological distress.” Which must be true because Steve is panting and while he’s got one hand braced on the bed the other is moving between his legs, pressing and rubbing his perineum, squeezing his balls.

“You were inWanda’s room.”

He nods.

“I don’t…_Bucky_?” He asks, and his voice breaks. He should have asked it already, it should have been the first question out of his mouth but he can’t bear to hear that the answer is no. “Wait. Maybe I don’t want to know yet.”

“I… am. Bucky. It’s me, Stevie.”

“What?” his voice is trembling. And he makes damned sure to stop touching himself like a creep.

Bucky stands. He comes closer. He has leather pants on…he’s hard. Steve moves on the bed, shifting and changing the angle of his body like he wants to keep him in sight. But that’s not quite right because his legs are spread, bent at the knees and he’s reaching for him with an outstretched hand.

“I didn’t die. The experiments done to me by Zola… I’ve done a lot of bad things over the years Steve. And, I don’t remember everything. I didn’t remember anything at all really but Wanda fixed me.”

He should get up and go make them some tea. They can sit next to each other at the kitchen table like civilized people and discuss the past and all they’ve lost and how lucky they are to have found each other again.

He wants that.

He knows they will do that. But first, first… “I love you. I have missed you so fucking much I don’t even want to go on without you.”

“Don’t say that,” Bucky says, and he puts a knee on the bed, is finally close enough for Steve to grab ahold of. He grabs him by the waist of his pants, pulls him closer. Bucky lets himself fall forward, bracing himself over Steve.

“I need you inside me. Everyday I think about how I didn’t…how we didn’t do that. I don’t want to wait a moment longer.”

Bucky’s nostrils flare and he actually shakes his head. “I’m not sure it’s a good idea just now. I feel very…unsettled. It wouldn’t be nice. I don’t quite know the person I was with you, Steve.”

“I don’t fucking care.” He whimpers and grinds back into the bed, the need to have his dominant take him is overwhelming. Dull pangs ripple upwards inside of him from the rim of his passage and deeper inside him. His hand drops down to his perineum, hot, sore, aching. It’s worse than it ever was. So bad he isn’t sure how he’ll survive if it goes on for too much longer.“Bucky?” he begs, and he can’t stop rubbing.

“Ass up,” he orders.

“Buck, I—“

“I have no patience,” he says, undoing his pants. His cock is hard and he fists it tightly, Steve’s mouth watering at the temptation before him. 

He nods and turns over, showing Bucky what he wants to see. Steve knows what he needs. He’s read the materials, he’s come to terms with it. Or so he’d thought, but the truth is that making himself vulnerable like this isn’t easy.

“Claim me,” he whispers.

He feels the bed dip behind him. Fingers touch his hole. Steve jerks away from the touch out of instinct and Bucky slaps his ass and growls warningly. “Sorry. Sorry.” Steve says, and he spreads his legs further apart in apology.

There’s a cock-head at his rim and it takes everything in him to not fight. “There’s no lube,” he says, instead.

“I’ll come with just the head in your hole and then fuck you properly. Try to relax. Rub your glands to help you open for me, Stevie.”

He shifts awkwardly, terrified and so fucking aroused as he presses fingers closer to his rim and then back behind his balls, digging in deep and painful. Spasms go through him and he comes dry, Bucky’s pheromones making him crazy. His cock is harder now, his balls heavier and he just aches.

“You’re very swollen. This will likely hurt you,” he says, not like he particularly cares but is just stating a fact.

“I’m okay. I can take it,” he says. Bucky presses forward and he feels a shiver go through him, fluid spills onto his hole and it burns, hot and molten against him. Steve swears and rubs his hand faster between his legs, so hard and fast, gliding and working the area, feeling muscles he didn’t know he had clench up to come. He spasms again but his cock is still dry. Bucky’s fingers are holding onto his cock, his weight is pressing into Steve and his body is giving way and letting him in.

He gasps, feels pinned and Bucky groans, cock spurting into him again, easing the way and something inside of him relaxes, Bucky’s cock slips in, lodges and he strokes himself, jerking himself off inside Steve’s passage. He puts his other hand on Steve’s balls, rubs them and pulls at them, hard and carelessly so Steve whines and spreads his legs wider.

“Good. There you go. You always thought it would be so awful. Is it Steve? Is it as bad as you feared?”

“Bucky,” he says, relieved. He sounds more like himself. “It’s good. I’m sorry we didn’t do this before. It’s—“ And Bucky comes in him. He feels it flood him, soothe something inside him and his cock starts to drip.

Bucky grabs his hips and shoves into him, gaining ground slowly, forcing Steve’s muscles to part and let him in. Each jab makes his cock spill and feels like a painful mini-orgasm. He can’t stop the sounds coming from him with each thrust. He can’t move away from them or even into them. He’s a hole just like he always suspected he would be but it’s good. It’s so fucking good. He didn’t know it would be like this.

“Yeah, there it is. Don’t fight me,” Bucky growls and thighs press behind his. He’s in all the way and it’s so intense Steve can’t take it. Bucky pulls out and slams back in, instantly fucking him hard, making no effort for Steve’s tight virgin passage. He’s brutal, drapes himself over Steve and uses his free hand to grab Steve’s balls again. “Hold them,” he orders and Steve gets a hand on them, lifting them like Bucky wants. Bucky spanks him then. The whole painful area of his perineum and his passage tightens on Bucky’s cock, clenches down and Bucky stills, grunts in pleasure and spanks Steve again, grinding deep as Steve’s body reflexively tightens up at the force of his strikes.

He sobs and comes and Bucky moans at that and spanks him some more. He tightens up, feels a build deep inside him and Bucky chuckles as Steve starts to pant under him. “You’re beautiful. I can’t believe you didn’t give this to me before. Can’t believe I let you deny us this. You’ll come again now,” he says, and hespanks him flush on his balls and sure enough Steve comes, even his cock spurting. His knees give out and he falls to the bed. Bucky rides him down, shoves his legs open some more and fucks him deep, lays over him and licks his neck. He bites Steve hard and Steve comes again, every inch of him sore and overwhelmed.

“Sore,” he says, because Bucky’s cock is still pistoning inside of him and even though he’s filled with come, feels it leaking out of him with each deep thrust of Bucky’s hips, his dominant is still hard, still desperately fucking into him and he’s so overstimulated that he’s starting to tremble. His hands slip under Steve, grab his tits and start working his nipples, aggressive and deep and he whimpers, hips tilting back in invitation even though he wants it to end.

“There you go. That’s the biology you fought so hard against. Offer me more. Give me all of it. Maybe I survived all of this just to devour you. To come and finally get what was mine.”

“I love you.” Steve comes and is so weak he almost passes out. Bucky comes inside of him and Steve is glad it’s over. He can’t take anymore. His passage throbs, his cock aches and his balls might be bruised tomorrow. Bucky doesn’t pull out. He shifts back and forth, grinding deeper and he’s still hard. A hand leaves his chest after one last deep, hard pinch and goes back to his perineum, right alongside his shaft, rubbing near the rim and he bucks against the touch like a wild animal. Bucky bites him again and he gives up even though he’s used to fighting.

It’s not fair. Bucky laughs like he understands. It burns and he closes his eyes, trying to figure out what Bucky is doing. He’s not trying to get a finger inside him like he thought, he’s looking for…. “No,” he says, stunned when Bucky finds the hard little gland deep inside him. He puts his otherhand on Steve’s cock, squeezing sharply enough that Steve adjusts his body how Bucky wants, hips up and up and Bucky is mounting him like he’s a bitch and now he’s totally desperate for him to stop, to not do this.

“Bucky. Bucky, please.”

“You could have gotten it out.”

“Surgery didn’t seem necessary,” he says, shocked at Bucky bringing them to this point so quickly. There’s one last connection they never had, one gland that would eventually disappear like a cyst after prolonged anal sex with a bonded partner. A designational hymen and Steve still has his after all this time.

People do get them removed. Like wisdom teeth or an appendix, there’s no real use for them in modern society because no one wants to be bonded that closely with someone, and be chemically dependent upon them for life. Except, apparently, for Bucky. Bucky who’s rubbing it and waiting for permission. 

“You’re mine.”

Steve is waiting, terrified. But, he isn’t fighting. “Say you want it, Stevie. I’ll make this final claim on you but you tell me you fucking want it like I know you do or I won’t do it.”

Steve wanted him to just take it. That’s the truth. “I love you. I’ll do whatever you want… and I, I won’t say no to you. Not again.”

“Then put your finger here. Go on,” he orders. Steve obeys slowly, gets his fingers positioned where Bucky’s are, feels the small nub of a gland that will release powerful chemicals inside him, allow Bucky’s hormones to be absorbed into his bloodstream.

“It’s supposed to be better than heroin,” Steve says, voice shaky.

“Until the end Steve. Forever.”

“It always should have been forever, Buck.” And that’s the truth. Bucky fucks him then, angling down, wanting to hit the gland with the head of his cock. It’s a difficult think to rupture. The first pass of it makes Steve yell. It’s bliss and agony in one. Bucky grunts and tries again and his hand covers Steve’s so they’re both pressing harder.

Bucky snarls as he fucks Steve hard, slamming into it over and over again until there’s a sudden yielding inside of him and Bucky comes. Bucky shivers and Steve breaks out into goosebumps. He’s floating, barely aware of his breathing or what’s going on around him and he can almost feel the change happening inside of him.

When Bucky pulls out of him he turns Steve over to his stomach and covers him, kisses him over and over again. “I remember,” he says, and Steve opens his eyes, stares into Bucky’s gaze and wipes at the tears that are on his cheeks.

“It was like she gave me the memories, but now I feel it like I should have done. Jesus, Steve. Fuck, I shouldn’t have done that, Stevie. You should have stopped me,” he buries his face in Steve’s neck.

“I wanted it. I want you,” Steve says, wrapping him up in his arms.

“It’s forever.”

“I’m too old to start dating someone new anyway,” Steve says, kissing his neck.

“That’s a ringing endorsement.”

Steve shrugs, smiles and for the first time in his entire life feels at peace. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> JFC what a bastard. I'm not sure I particularly like this ending and it might get tweaked later on but I think I'm a bit burned out on BDSM AU's at the moment. I just didn't want to leave it unfinished because I know how much that sucks. Hopefully, this is a satisfactory ending for our boys, at least. Ever since Endgame I think I'll always envision Wanda and Bucky as friends so if it seems a little out of left field, that's why she's here. Hope you enjoyed it, do please comment and thank you for reading :)
> 
> edit-- someone asked if i was done with BDSM or Stucky. Hell to the no! it's just that i have a third Stucky BDSM AU and i'd implied it would be three in a row and that is no longer happening. might be a month or two. i'm working on a few stucky stories and a few destiel stories and might post something by the end of the week ;)

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! As mentioned in Just A Sniper, I started three different BDSM AU's at the same time, all with D/s designations as I wasn't in an ABO mood. Just A Sniper was the one that I became obsessed with. I want to put out the other 2 stories but do have a fear that they are too similar. If you agree, please DON'T TELL ME! Just move along to something else. The only time I'm grinding to a halt on writing this story is when I'm worried there are too many similarities. I hope y'all like this story, anyway. And if you do, please DO TELL ME! 
> 
> Me= golden retriever. comments = snausages
> 
> when you give a dog a snausage you get massive productivity.


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